


Just Someone to Save You

by thEmotioNeeds



Category: Big Bang (Band)
Genre: Abuse, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/M, M/M, Romance, Slight Humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-25
Updated: 2018-09-08
Packaged: 2019-04-27 15:22:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 31,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14428416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thEmotioNeeds/pseuds/thEmotioNeeds
Summary: "The world is bad you know? Full of bad people. You´re just an innocent guy in this big world. Way too innocent."Inspired by OneRepublics´ "Someone to save you" along the way.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Dear reader,  
> thanks so so much for reading this story. Please bear with me as this is actually my first fictional writing ever and honestly, I still feel uncomfortable as I am only used to writing business style reports. But still I very much hope you´ll like it. Feel free to share your thoughts or ideas with me of course! Anyways, now I don´t want to keep you back from reading and hope you enjoy!

 

 

> **"Someone to Save You"**
> 
> **____________________________________________________**
> 
> “All right  
>  Sit down and spill your heart  
>  Let's start from the very start  
>  'Cause I can see by your eyes  
>  You're wasted  
>  Your energy comes and goes  
>  You're taking your time, you know  
>  Nothing can change what happened, so...  
>    
>  Back to the start now  
>  I won't let you go this way now  
>    
>  Honesty  
>  Is what you need  
>  It sets you free  
>  Like someone to save you  
>  Let it go  
>    
>  But hurry now  
>  There's undertow  
>  And I don't want to lose you now  
>    
>  Now  
>  Oh my  
>  Look at your bright stars fade so  
>  How much can you take?  
>    
>  Honesty  
>  Is what you need  
>  It sets you free  
>    
>  Like someone to save you  
>  Let it go  
>  But hurry now  
>  There's undertow  
>  And I don't want to lose you now  
>    
>    
>  What you need is  
>  Someone to save you“

(Lyrics: OneRepublic, “Someone To Save You”)

 

 

_"And I knew if I would do this now that there was no tomorrow. But the time to do this had now come. I was sorry. So sorry."_

 

* * *

 

 

**Prologue**

 

 

"Nothing??"

 Youngbae shook his head in frustration. "Nothing", he replied and let out a heavy sigh by checking his phone.

"It´s not that I´m George Clooney in person but is my face that horrible?", I moaned while looking into the mirror.

When I accepted Youngbae´s offer to work at his model agency a year ago I never expected to receive real offers, honestly. My face was not what society would call pretty anyways, but it had been worth a try. There were some smaller offers from time to time but not really worth mentioning. Overall, offers that involved high public attention werenot really of my interest anyways because I would be better off without my parents knowing about this job. They were highly “Christian”, if you could even call it like that, and that not to a healthy extend. They just wanted me to live at home and work at their Church community day and night like the “perfect son”. When Youngbae offered me to live at his for some time I was more than happy, but my parents were not. Even nowadays they still forced me to work there. I tried quitting but that had teached me that moving out was the maximum my parents would bear me to do. The salary was low and without Youngbae I would be homeless for sure. These tiny model jobs indeed brought some extra money, but it was not really a lot. Sure, it is not that my life depended on this job, but still. If I really wanted to go and study that particular study at that particular university, I would need to save a lot. Therefore, I got a third job. And that was a job I was not really proud of.

"I´m sorry Daesung, but they´d always choose someone else over you. I just don´t know why-" Youngbae jumped up in excitement when he heard the doorbell ring, and immediately told me to leave the room as fast as possible and not to disturb him for a while.

"B...but-"

 I didn´t even have the chance to ask. Of course I did like I was told, still wondering why he was so excited about the client he was about to meet. _Well, it wouldn´t be me they´d choose anyways so I shouldn´t have cared right? They wouldn’t care about me either._ No one has  really ever cared about my feelings not even my family- they´ve actually cared less than anyone else. They just wanted me to be the perfect son - that kind of son they could show to friends at their church community and that´s it.  It´s true that I was kind of faithful and believed in god and all those stuff but being at church 24/7 every day of the week was frustrating, made me tired and gave me that odd feeling as I didn’t share good memories with that place.

My heart almost skipped a beat when the door flung open and an overly excited Youngbae came over to grab my wrists, but I´ve been too lazy to get up so I just moaned at him and told him to leave.

"Just get your pretty ass off of that sofa and come with me idiot, you got a job!" Wait. He couldn´t be serious, but just by looking at his overwhelming happy face it must´ve been true. The next second he´d already put his business face on. "Okay business mode now",  he said with an overly serious voice while putting on his sunglasses, and I couldn´t help but chuckle at the sight in front of me. He always did this when he was  getting into his "business mode". It was kind of amusing and funny, and admittingly looked ridiculous, but I had never told him that.

“Why are you so damn excited Youngbae?!”

Suddenly he grabbed my shoulders. “Well, after you´ll have seen you´ll be surprised. Don´t ruin that Daesung, don´t. I don´t know what mood you are in or whatever – just don´t ruin this. You´re super handsome and awesome and you know that. Alright? Alright.”

“B-“ But I did not even start speaking when he pressed a finger on my lips. “Not now, later.”

When Youngbae lead me to his office and opened the door my eyes widened in surprise. I actually knew those men. They were kind of new but also kind of  famous in the fashion scene – well that´s what Youngbae had told me recently, and that more than one time. Whenever he was on his phone, reading magazines, whatever. Every five minutes he would tell or show me something about those two designers. That explains why Youngbae was so excited after all. But this wasn’t going to be easy. And I soon knew that this job could change a lot of things. Also, that moment I didn´t know that the two men I was facing would actually change my whole life forever either in a good or a bad way.

 

"Nice to meet you, Kang Daesung."


	2. Weirdo

_#Seunghyun_

 

I immediately offered my hand to the man who was just staring at us obviously surprised. Youngbae hit him with his elbow and said man just mumbled some excuses.

"Choi Seunghyun, JC Fashion, nice to meet you, Kang Daesung."

When our eyes met for the first time, Daesung put on a wide smile as if nothing had happened and stepped right towards me offering me his hand as well. Even after letting go of my hand his gaze was still resting on me.

"Kwon Jiyong, JC Fashion. Nice to meet you as well", my partner introduced himself.

"Kang Daesung. Thank you for choosing me, you won´t regret it, I promise.", he smiled and bowed to the both of us. When I turned my face to Jiyong he had that smirk on his face. I knew that smirk and soon I knew Daesung would be the one regretting us choosing him as our model, not the other way around.

"You´re kind of sexy indeed, I knew I could trust Seunghyun´s skills."

"T...thank you I guess?", he stuttered while - Were his cheeks really blushing?! Well, he was sexy though. His face was not what society would call pretty but it was pure - pure, innocent, but wild and fresh -  exactly what I needed. Oh god, that sounded like I was observing some kind of fresh piece of expensive meat. No seriously: our new project was going to be big or at least according to the plan; and with Daesung that plan had a very good start.

Regardning Jiyong, the good thing about him and me was that we both did have quite the same opinion in everything and  we´ve both been  ambitious in what we were doing and how we were doing it. Well, guess not everything but still. We´d been friends since we´ve been kids, so for almost twenty years, and somewhen those innocent little boys had decided to start a fashion business and be super rich - admittedly the last part is still some kind of hopeless thoughts that got stuck in the clouds - but who knows. If that stupid partner of mine wouldn´t have destroyed my relationship with my ex-girlfriend, Sunmi, who was also an important part of the team, we could´ve been fuckin´ rich by now so it was obviously Jiyongs´ fault but he would´ve never admitted it of course. Sunmi had been responsible for everything else next to design and production. Marketing, distribution, communications, sales, finance. We could have hired other people of course. Indeed, we did. But no one survived more than one month, and the reason for that was no one else than Jiyong, because he wouldn’t keep his fingers to himself or nagging the newbies to death. And no one was better than her. And then, one day, when I thought Sunmi was on her way to her mother, but she wasn’and came home earlier, he thought it might be a great idea to seduce me while I was drunk. Ever since, we are doing all of this on our own.

"Great, that´s how we´re gonna do it then."

"Okay, I´m going to be there tomorrow by 6 pm then?" Daesung´s face was calm but by biting his lips I could tell how nervous he was.

"Great! Dae...."

"Just call me Daesung, it´s okay. We´re gonna work together for a long time from now on so forget about any formalities."

"That´s how we work, great Daesung!" Jiyong grinned at him still giving him that lewd face. Didn´t that make him feel uncomfortable or anything? Like, he didn´t care at all! Amazing indeed. Cause once Jiyong found his next target he wouldn’t let got too soon and I actually meant what I said. "Okay Daesung, great!" I smiled. "And don´t hesitate to ask, we...won´t bite...probably." I said, giving a glare to Jiyong who looked like he was about to jump on him as soon as he had the opportunity.

Daesung grinned widely. "I´ll keep that in mind."

 

  

_  
_

_#_ _Daesung_

 

Never again. Well that´s what I thought for now, but no, I actually meant it.

"Youngbae, we should stop drinking after every job offer", I complained, grabbing my head in pain as I was trying to lift up but immediately gave up on it and closed my eyes again. That pain was killing me, it always was after drinking  slightly a little bit too much just because he - we - got an amazing job offer- "Doooooon´t! Damn Sammy I love you but-" I shove Sammy, a well-grown Border Collie, off carefully but he immediately leaned his head on my shoulder touching my right cheek with his icy cold wet nose. He always did that when I was in pain, even though it was all my fault. When they say dogs are more reliable than humans then I´d agree sometimes. No, quite often actually. Back to the day that Sammy sat in front of Youngbae´s – and unfortunately my-  apartment, lost and almost frozen last winter, we did not even hesitate for a second and adopted him and welcomed him warmly. I mean who would have left this adorable dog on the street while it was like -20 degrees – humans are heartless creatures sometimes. He licked my cheek again and started jumping around and put his toy on my chest, tickling my feet with his black-white fluffy fur. I really loved him but that dog needed lots of attention and activity.

"Not now Sammyyy" I moaned and threw it somewhere not knowing whe- "Ouch! Sammy no."  - well there it was. I chuckled still having my eyes closed.

"Daesung: we should stop this. Seriously."

"Say what."

"Sorry. It´s kind of my fault I´d guess but you’re not that innocent though!"  I only mumbled some curses against him and was about to fall back to sleep when I felt Sammy licking my cheek again. " Okay Sammy I should get up you´re r-" Opening my eyes I was not facing Sammy but no one else than Youngbae grinning at me widely.

"Good morning."

"You´re gross!!" And my right foot found its way to kick his ass. "Ouch!"

" Don´t lick my cheek then pervert!"

"You know I love you bro. You know I love my girlfriend over anything else , don´t get any false hopes", he said leaving the room but not without giving me a wink, and that was reason enough to follow him into his kind of messy kitchen - damn I just cleaned it yesterday. _Men_. "I´m not gay and you know that so stop assuming that I am."

"I´m not assuming, I´m observing. I´m not blind, Daesung. Like yesterday...and you know being gay or whatever is just as normal as everything else, don´t act like it’s a disease…" That- !

"You know my family would kill me." Expecting him to say something he breathed in sharply and continued. "It´s not that I want to offend you in any way but -"

"Youngbae, that´s unfair. That job is not that much of a sin."

"No?" Giving me that judging look I started to doubt myself but I´d not let him notice that. "It´s not that I´m helping someone to betray someone it´s more some kind of helping someone socializing you know?"

Again that judging face. "So that´s how you call it." Well, it was kind of if you look at it. I had many clients, many male indeed but I did not care about gender and age, and doing inappropriate stuff wasn´t allowed so where was the problem, it´s good money in the end.

"I told you a thousand times, not more than talking. Not even that much of actual physical contact."

"Well, if you say that." He sighed. "Just...just be careful."

"Don´t worry, what could happen huh?"

"The world is bad you know? Full of bad people. You´re just an innocent guy in this big world. Way too innocent."     

 

**_______________________________**

Youngbae nodded in agreement. " You still look good, don´t worry. They will put on make-up anyways so-"

"You know I´m not THAT self-confident these days."

"Have I ever lied to you?"

"No." I sighed. He was right. Youngbae was the sincerest and most honest guy I´d ever met and that was just one of the many reasons he was my best friend and more than important to me - he´s always  been the person I´d ask for advice or just...anything. "Trust me" he said in the most comforting way he could´ve and ruffled my hair as he always did.

"Thanks Youngbae, you know you really mean a lot to me."

"Wohooo no gay attack please."

"Ya!" I couldn´t help it but gave him punch. "As a friend idiot! And: I´m not gay."

"Oh what a pity!" Jiyong passed by, again having that lewd look on his face. Of course I noticed when we first met already but I wouldn´t care at all not even now but I hoped it wouldn´t get worse. Youngbaes´ gaze followed him until he disappeared behind the entrance door. "Weirdo."

"Well....true", a baritone voice agreed from behind. Youngbae´s eyes widened a bit in shock and I almost couldn´t hold my laughter in but managed it somehow. We turned around and there was Seunghyun, giving us a wide grin.

"S...sorry I didn´t mean to offend..."

"Don´t worry, he actually IS  a weirdo indeed. And he actually jumps everything that has a whole so be careful." Seunghyun took of his sunglasses and rubbed his eyes. Damn, he must´ve cried the whole night. It´s not like he didn´t look good - he did. That messy dark brown hair, his well-tanned skin, that...whole body indeed. I mean he looked good by just wearing leather pants and a black shirt covered by a blazer and his...hands? He turned around to check up on himself in the car window, fixed his hair and then turned to Youngbae, putting his sunglasses on: "I think you can leave now. There´s nothing you can do anyways so..."

Youngbae seemed to hesitate for a second. "Well, I´d like to keep an eye on him-"

"Really trust me. Even Jiyong, he´s harmless."

Youngbae turned to me. "Trust me, nothing will happen, and since when did you start worrying?" I asked while I gave him a questioning look. "I don’t know I just feel....there´s just something."

"Youngbae?"

"Yeah?"

"Don´t worry, really. Even...tonight. Just don´t worry. I told you it´s n-"

"It´s not that dangerous, I know." He was about to say more but then closed his mouth again, ruffled my hair as he always did and left. The last thing I saw was him looking at me by looking into the rear view mirror.

"It seems like you mean a lot to him, he seems to be worried…there must be a reason." Seunghyun started giving me a questioning look. There was a reason indeed but I´d never tell anyone but Youngbae. Even me telling him took me a few months because...I don´t know, it´s my business and everyone would have told me to stop anyways and so did Youngbae and that´s already enough. Nothing  had happened to me yet right? And I didn’t know why it should.

"It´s nothing." I grinned. "We have work to do right?"

I walked towards the door with Seunghyun keeping his spot, and when I turned around he was just staring at me....blankly. Was it even me he was staring at?

"Mr. Choi?"

No reaction

"Mr. Choi!"

Still no reaction.

"Seunghyun."

"Yeah?"

I just called him by his first name. Shit. But it seemed like he didn´t even notice

"We´ve got work to do!" I said cheerfully giving him a wide smile. And it was kind of surprising but he actually smiled back at me.

"Well, let´s start!"

 

When we went inside the building I was a little surprised ´cause I just....expected something more expensive, I don´t know. The walls were white and the furniture - well it was stylish somehow- but there was definitely less than in Youngbaes´ apartment. I´d guess that´s what they call stylish and “modern“ nowadays.

"Well, welcome to our studio. Do you wear make-up?" Jiyong came in and gave me a serious stare. "Be honest."

"....yeah. O....occasionally? No not really, but I´m not really confident with my face."

"Why are you a model then."

"I...I don´t know. Youngbae gave me this job to earn additional money."

Seunghyun stepped in. "Ah, so this is only kind of part-time job.....?"

Okay seriously why´ve they been asking so much, it´s my life and I was just doing my job right here so why couldn´t we´ve just gone back to work. "Kind of, yeah. I work at church for my parents sake and I do have a third job but why do you even care?"

"What´s your third job then?"

"W....why do you even care?"

Seunghyun shoved his shoulders. "I don´t know, Youngbae seemed so worried and ...I don´t know I like...knowing about people."

"Well I don´t like people to know about me so could you just stop asking please?" Oh shit that must have sounded rude. Shit. "S...sorry I didn´t-"

"It´s okay. You´re right, let´s get to work." he just said and left. I wasn´t supposed to sound rude or anything but I just hated people asking. And I didn´t like people in general. I don´t like humans at all. Even though I´m one myself. I just don´t know why. Well, actually my life hadn´t been the best so far and people I met were actually really cruel to me except for Youngbae and that´s it. So I do have my reasons; but would someone ever understand? Trusting people was actually a hard thing for me even though Youngbae was a person I kind of trusted because we were best friends. But even if it was him, I´d not bet all my life.

 

„Daesung don´t be that shy, just be yourself, just act as if this´d be your home!”

Sure. I´d just pull my pants off and that´s it. I´ve never had a more unorganized and weird shooting, seriously. Then I saw Seunghyun whispering to Jiyong and no one knew what kind of masterplan was next.

“Why don´t you just leave the shirt and…”

“You know I can´t do that actually…”

Of course.

“Come on, I can smell that you have a good body indeed so just take it off!”

I sighed. “I´d only take it off when I´d be alone at ho- “

“Well. That´s actually what we were trying to say.”

I couldn´t even breathe my next breath when Mr. Choi stood right behind me and bowed his head over right to my ear, almost touching my ear. Damn. Feeling his breath in my ear made my body shudder all over - and when he started whispering with his rough and dark baritone voice - I thought I´d die.

“Lift your arms.”

Stupid as I was, I did like I´d been told, which I was already regretting when he grabbed my shirt and removed it quickly. Thank you brain.

“Woah.”

“Are you crazy?!”

Jiyong smirked: “Well it was Seunghyun not me though…although I seriously enjoy the view.”

“W…what is all of this huh??”

“We said be yourself, at that´s what you do at home so dang, that´s it!”

“Okay, get dressed again.” He commanded throwing my shirt to me. Thanks god.

“We´re going to take a photo series you taking off your shirt!”

Okay, I actually wanted to say no but there was no use for it. It´s not that I didn’t want to but……No I didn’t want to.  But the money. But I didn´t want to. But……money. But everyone would see those pictures after I mean it´s not that they weren´t famous, no – they were so…damn this wasn´t right. All the other jobs had been for smaller fashion shops or magazines but this -  this was something big. Why did they choose me in the first place, I mean there are so many good-looking guys out there, why me?

 

 

* * *

 

 

# _Seunghyun_

 

I swear he´d mostly like to kill us right now. If he´d have only known that we won´t put on make-up -  we´d be so dead. Well it was our decision in the end; we didn’t pay him for telling us how to do our job. And a bit more of self-esteem was definitely something he needed anyways so...damn why did he resist on pulling off his shirt it´s not our fault for sure.

“Okay, we´re done for the day then!”

And there it was. That expected startled and questioning look on his face.

“B…but I thought these were only test shots! What about Make…..”

Jiyong already put on a big smirk. “Make-Up? This is all about being natural and being confident about yourself, forgetting about whether you look good or bad in “peoples´ eyes” you know?”, Jiyong said in a slightly sarcastic and quiet way, padding Daesung´s back.

“Thanks a lot.”

Ouch. I gave Jiyong a punch into his ribs which made the red-haired man quietly cry out in pain.

“No no, what he actually meant...” I tried to explain but there was obviously no use.

“I get your point; I don´t care. You´re paying me, I will just follow and that´s literally it.”

“Could you – then- please just pretend you´re enjoying this thing right here?”

“I´m enjoying it.” The way he said it he sounded like he didn´t mean it all. He didn´t look like it. No – he didn´t act like it at all.  There was no use for a model like him but he was in fact the best one for this job and losing him was the worst-case scenario.

“Nice try, but pretending is useless. Go home for now and have some rest and…. yeah.”

But he didn´t even realize I was talking to him, while he kept staring at his phone and biting his lips again. Not that I was curious, but I was curious indeed. I´ve always been curious and yes, it´s a bad habit but guess what – it had already helped me a lot.  If people weren´t curious – wouldn´t the world be hell? Would there be a world at all? This is how being a human works – being curious. So, I didn´t care.

“Oh I...I can go now?”

Jiyong just sighed, waved off - “Whatever. Tomorrow same time – better mood.” – and left.

Obviously confused, he stared at the door and then at me, and he actually made me chuckle a bit. Cute…somehow.

“I…will leave then.”

“Sure, do as you want.”

“...fine”, he bowed to me and left, when I saw he had left his jacket. Not being sure whether I could still catch him I grabbed the jacket, ran after him and – woho – almost slipped when I took a first step. Winter sucked, seriously. Where the hell did he go? As I looked to my right I saw a car stopping right in front of Daesung at the other side if the street. Wow, a Porsche, not bad.

“Daesung!” Obviously shocked he opened the door again and just looked at me blankly. “What.”

“You forgot your jacket. And it´s really cold so here I am. Don´t worry, not for long.”

He grabbed his jacket. “That’s it?”

“Yeap, you´re welcome, and-“ I took a short look at the driver, a young, kinda good-looking, well nothing special, man, ”have fun.” And closed the door.

Damn, that man was moody as hell. And who was that man? He was rich, for sure, but else? A- I almost slipped when I heard my phone ringing. SMS – _unknown number_. Grinning widely, I read the message again and again and again. “Thanks, Mr.Choi.”

 

 

Weirdo.

 


	3. Caught

 

_As I kept running I was thinking of what would happen if I wouldn’t find you in time. And I kept on running, but you were nowhere to be found._

 

_#Daesung_

 

“Who is that??“ The young man asked, never leaving his focus on the street.

It was already dark outside and the street lights had already turned on. The winter had come quite early this year and so had the snow. Seemed like the predicted snowstorm had reached Seoul earlier than expected. I watched people walking outside, protecting their faces with their scarfs as much as possible. When looking at Seungri I wondered whether they were even able to see anything. Most of them were probably heavily looking forward to reach their destination soon; unlike me. I saw everyone rushing, except for one couple; they were just walking, hand in hand, as if they could not get worked up by anything. They simply looked...I dont know.

“That? That was my boss…. or whatever he is.”

“Whatever he is?”

“Well, I got a job. A model job.” Noticing the doubt in his words, I made things clear. “Seungri, you don´t need to be jealous, don´t worry.” I smiled at him and stroked his hand slightly which always made me shiver all over. God damn, I really hated this. It´s not that he had been paying me for any kind of physical contact at all but I actually got more money IF I did afterwards, so I was – not really- okay with it.

My heart almost skipped a beat when my phone rang – quite loudly. When I read the message I couldn´t help but chuckle bit.

 

_You called me Seunghyun before, why that formality all of a sudden Mr.Kang:D_

 

Help Shit. He noticed. Whatever, he seemed to have a sense of humor anyway.  Damn, no one should know about this. No one. I would have to pretend that he is my boyfriend. But I am not gay, and both of them were or at least bi or whatever, so: no option. Just a friend? They would never believe me. Or maybe they would not ask? It was a good thing that Seungri – or actually anyone - couldn´t read my mind. If he only knew how much I hated this job. If this wasn´t for money. Sighing at my thoughts, I took a glare at Seungri who sat there like frozen – like this would have been the first time. Hoped he didn´t have any weird plans or things wanted to ask me to do. I mean, I´m not a prostitute, forcing me to do anything sexual…it would take me much to go this far. I mean, Seungri was a nice guy but that´s all and to be honest….

“Daesung!”

“Y…yeah? Sorry, I got lost in thoughts.”

“It´s okay, darling”, he smiled, gently touched my thighs, and gave me an insecure grin – heaven help. And to be honest: yes, he was creepy sometimes. Then again, he hadn´t done anything inappropriate and he paid me well – very well. If I´d do this job forever, I´d never have to do anything else. IF. As soon as I´d be able to quit this job, I would, promised. But right now, I couldn´t help it and had to do whatever Seungri wanted to. “So, what do you want to do today, Seungri?”

“What about going home? Home to my house.”                                                                  

Shit. _“No”_ I wanted to scream but still I nodded silently in agreement. This was going to the wrong direction. Really. He had never invited me to his house before! Even though it´d be interesting to know how that guy was living. He was rich, and yes, he was driving a Porsche, and yes, if he invited me for dinner then to the most expensive restaurants of the city and yes, sometimes I enjoyed it, but just for a short moment. Admittedly, my family had never been rich and money had always been enough for living only - and that´s it. Instead of money for living, it had always been religion for living, which reminded me that I had to do my job at church tomorrow morning. Fuck my life. Life sucked these days. It really sucked.

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

 

“But Jiyong, we need to keep him!” This discussion was useless.

“Seunghyun, but how. I mean he doesn´t really enjoy his job!”

“It´s because of us. Like…the way we treat him. I don´t think he hates this job. He just needs a bit time and needs to get to know our style of…working you know?”

Jiyong didn´t look like he was agreeing with what I just said but nodded in agreement anyways. Disagreements appeared as fast as they´ve been solved and so did this one. He, too, agreed on the fact that we needed Daesung. We really did. Indeed, I agreed on the fact that he did not look like he enjoyed this but...I didn´t know. I didn´t think he hated this, there was something else. Just now with the text message. He seemed so cold when I ran after him and then all of the sudden his message? For sure. I didn’t know what it was but there was just something. Jiyong might not know, how could he anyways.

“And admit it, you enjoyed the view.”

Jiyong smirked. “Of course I did. He´s a hella sexy fellow. Almost beating you, Seunghyun.”, he grinned at me.

“Tz. As if!”

“Well, prove me otherwise then.” Jiyong came a step closer, grabbed my necktie and pushed me closer and stopped as we stood face to face. Shit. This had happened once and I swore to myself that this would never happen again.

“Jiyong, no. Please, this is wrong”, I breathed, avoiding direct eye contact as well as I could. But as my breath was getting heavier his smirk grew even bigger. “Come on Seunghyun, I know how much you enjoyed last time, hm?”, he whispered, caressing my inner thighs; and yes I felt the blood rushing down there. Shit. I knew I had lost anyways so for now it was only a question of time. “Yes for the price of losing my girlfriend.”

“But do you have anything to lose now?”

“Fuck.”

Following my word I closed the gap, crashing my lips on Jiyongs. The moment our lips touched, Jiyong pulled me closer towards the sofa, pushed me down and sat on top of me.

“You won´t regret it Seunghyun”, he smirked at me.

He was so wrong.

 

 

 

_#Daesung_

 

Wow. That was the only thing I could still say when we had arrived. When he said he was rich, I didn’t know he was THAT rich. Like probably the richest of the richest. Or at least his parents were, whatever. We were standing in front of an enormously huge white villa, to describe it better, in front of those stereotypical houses the richest of rich people had in dramas and movies and I did not exaggerate, not a bit.

“Well...welcome to my home.” He looked at me, looking totally insecure, and waiting for me to say something but I was speechless. “Uhm…uh well, that´s huge!”

“Let´s go inside yeah?” He started walking and at gave me a sign to follow him. I was wondering as he would usually take my hand, even though he never did that in public places but only in private where no one could see.

“Don´t worry, this is still my moms´ and dads´ house, they are owning a billion company which I´m going to lead later but right now I´m still in my studies.”

“W…wow! Why didn´t you say that earlier?”

“I don´t know, I was scared that…I don´t know, you´re here for money anyways, so I simply don´t know”, he said looking on the floor and trying to avoid eye contact us much as possible. “I just…wanted you to know, sorry for not telling earlier.”

“Nonono, I´m…just a bit surprised I mean…I know you had money anyways, it is not that much of a surprise but….”

He was leading me into a huge hallway, checking whether there was someone inside or not. Damn, this looked fancy. Living like that later…well, this was probably a bit TOO fancy. Leading me through a door at the end of the hallway we entered another hallway made of glass and, I couldn´t believe my eyes when I saw a pool as huge as a public pool, just fancier. Entering the room at the end of the hallway, I saw some kind of chilling area or living room with a bar, and much more.

“You…do you like it?”

“If I like it?? This is awesome!” But wait. “What…are we going to do? I did not bring swimming clothes or anything, cause I didn´t know- “

“No it´s okay! We have plenty of new ones here! There are various parties held over here so...yeah. And we don´t need to swim if you want!”

“Huh? Nono! It looks fun!” My inner me was screaming _No!_ but rejecting his offer would be rude. His question was more of a rhetorical question anyways, there was no way for saying no. But I would be almost naked. In front of Seungri. Shit. Okay, just imagine it´s Youngbae, yes Youngbae! Seungri gave a pair of swimming pants – if you could call that pants – and gave me some time to change in a changing room. If this window just wouldn´t be that small...Damn, I just felt so naked. Money, Daesung, money.

“Daesung are you done?”

 _NO_.

“Y…yes.” I answered and opened the door. I swear I saw his jaw dropping for a moment but it must have been my imagination. For him – well it´s not that he was chubby or whatever – you could not say that he had that body with the wow-effect. But what I noticed however was that _his_ pants were _definitely_ too tight as well. As long as he did not…whatever.

When I first jumped into the water it felt amazing. When was the last time I had done this – 5 years? 6 years ago? When I was a kid I did not have anything – no hobbies, no toys, no friends, not even a small job to earn some money. My parents had never allowed any of these things. It had always been family and church. ´ _As long as we have each other and our church community and you believe in god everything will be fine, and you won´t need anything else. And why earning money that you´d spent on useless stuff anyways.´_ Only when I turned 18 I got a job at church, where my father worked as a priest.

“Damn, you must work out hard”, Seungri grinned at me. “You´ve been swimming for like 10 minutes straight now.”

“Oh I…I didn´t notice, sorry. It´s just…I haven’t done this in a long time…years, to be honest.” I, too, left the pool as Seungri had already done and went after him as he walked towards…a whirlpool. I think this whirlpool was way too small for the two of us. Not considering the fact that it was made for at least six, if not more, people. It couldn´t have been big enough if there was Seungri as well. But it again felt so nice.

“But why haven´t you done this in years? What?? Why?”

Because I´m not as fucking rich as you are and my childhood really sucked, while you ate with a golden spoon.

“Childhood, parents, whatever.” Saying that he came closer – too close. Money Daesung, money. “Please do not ask or anything, please.”

“O…okay? Then I won´t I guess. But…you´re 21 now, like…”

I sighed, leaned back and closed my eyes. It was so quiet in here, only the sound of silence, bubbling water and…” Daesung?” And Seungri. “Oh, sorry, no it´s okay, I didn´t mean to be rude or anything”, I said, giving him a sad smile, “it´s…complicated, you know?” Suddenly I felt a hand softly caressing my upper thighs, slowly moving up the holy region- _be careful my friend_. Be. Careful. The contract said no sexual interaction. Kissing was not included but I just hoped…. that no. But hell – the money. And…I never kissed a guy, not even a girl. At my age – how pathetic. But I did not want it to be with Seungri either. Seriously. It might sound pathetic for a man but I wanted my first kiss to be special and…with someone special.

“It´s already late!”

“Why, what time is it??”

“Past midnight….I mean you can sleep with me – I mean you could sleep over we have enough rooms so….”

No, no, NO.  Like really, was he trying to seduce me or anything? Probably yes. Did I want him to seduce me? Probably no. However, this was gonna be fun night.

 

 

 

 _#The other morning_   

 

It must have been late already as the first sunrays met my face when I opened my eyes. To be honest, I hadn´t slept that well in months. Stretching my body, I saw my phone blinking like crazy. SHIT. I had to be at the shooting place in about one hour.

Thanks god Youngbae immediately responded to my call.

_“Daesung you´re okay??? You didn´t even come back home this night what happened??”_

“Nothing I´m still at Seungris pl…”

_“Don´t tell me that-!”_

“Hell no, Youngbae, why should I! Don´t worry.”

_“You always say that.”_

I sighed. “Trust me. But...I do have the shooting in about one hour, they wanted me to come earlier, and I don´t know how to get there.”

_“Sorry man, I´m out of the city. Just take a cab there or...!”_

“Well…the thing is I lost my purse. I swear I had it yesterday!”

_“Shit. Okay do you think you can ask Seungri?”_

“Well...I have to now anyways so I think yeah.”

_“Sorry mate. Subway and bus would take too long for now as it starts in about one hour already so just ask him and... keep me updated alright?”_

“Sure. Thanks dude!”

 _“See you tonight",_ he said and ended the call. But he was right, I had to ask him. All of a sudden, someone knocked at the door. “Can I come in?” Seungri. Best timing.

 

“Yeah sure, the door is open!” Following my words, the door opened and Seungri came in, looking like he had just woken up as well.

“Looks like you´re running late. Need a cab?” he grinned widely. “S…sorry I heard you talking to someone and….”

“No….no it´s okay that would actually be really nice!”

“Cool, okay get ready and I will bring you there.”

 

When arriving at the shooting place, Jiyong and Seunghyun must have been already there as both of their cars were standing in front…of…this tiny wooden house? Whatever it was. Right before knocking at the door, I felt Seungri right behind me. I sighed and then turned to him. “It was really nice that you brought me here but….”     “I need to pee. Really badly. Like really badly. And you know I need like 40 minutes home!", he moaned.

Sighing, I again knocked at the door but unfortunately nobody opened. After trying again and again and again I decided to just enter but – no one. Weird. Hearing some noises from upstairs, I went up, Seungri still right behind me. If I would have known what I was going to see I would have stopped and turned around right away. Both – mostly naked – were so busy with being pleasured that they hadn´t even noticed us entering the room. Jiyong, who was sitting on Seunghyun, was about to lick his neck when our eyes met, but he just looked at me greedily and continued with Seunghyun who had his eyes closed and was moaning, and then went down to lick his left nipple. “Y…Yes right there!” Admittedly, to see Seunghyun half-naked, yes, he looked sexy but…STOP! Daesung, stop.

“I cannot believe the both of you continue even though we´re in here.”

Upon hearing my words Seunghyun opened his eyes in shock and got rid of Jiyong and immediately grabbed his shirt.

“Oh, come on Daesung, I can see right down there that you enjoyed the view", Jiyong smirked and stood up. Seunghyun, who hadn’t said anything yet, just sat there hiding his face.

“And who is your little friend right here?”

“Well, that´s easy. I´m Seunghyun, called Seungri, and I really need to pee.”

 

“Wait I will bring you there, it´s down here.”

“I…I can go…”

“Nono.” He neglected and grabbed Seungris arm and they were gone. RIP Seungri.

 

“Don´t look at me. This wasn´t supposed to happen. I was just…there is no explanation.”

“Well…no matter how desperate you are you must be REALLY desperate. He jumps everything that has a hole? Indeed.” Ouch, that was mean.

“Hey, he´s still my friend okay??”, he declared in a serious tone.

“Well, guess more than a friend-“

Now that he had put his clothes on he stood up and faced me directly. Grabbing my shoulders, he stared directly into my eyes – that man scared me right now – and started speaking with a low but kind of threatening voice.

“Daesung. Listen to me. What you just saw…just forget it. It….it happened once and that´s it. I am not gay and not bi but- “

 _Sexually frustrated_ I wanted to say but I really couldn’t have said that, that wasn´t even my type.

 

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

 

Sexually frustrated. That´s actually what I wanted to say. I don´t know why I had been doing what I was doing but my girlfriend had left me quite a while ago and she…well, we never had sex because she was highly catholic and she grew up with the belief to not have sex before marriage. It´s a wonder that it was her who had left me – because I slept with a guy yes – and not me who left her. I really loved her, no question. And at that time I wasn´t even sober. I didn´t even remember that we actually had sex. I had been so shocked when she broke up. I loved her -  I really did. A lot. We had been together for two damn years! Suddenly I felt a tear running down my cheek. Shit. Daesung was still here

“...but?”, he asked with a questioning face. He seemed confused but not to have noticed that I was about to cry.

“Nothing”, I managed to say. “Please forget about this okay? But who told you to come this early?”

Daesung just gave me a questioning look. “Y…you told me to come earlier and here I am. I mean I can le….”

“What, no but…” What the hell. We were interrupted by Daesungs` companion, boyfriend, whatever he was, who came up the stairs and rushed over. My phone rang so I took it out and checked my messages.

“Daesung!” He shortly gave me a glare and started to speak silently, almost whispering.

“I will leave now if that´s okay, I should be at school already.”

“Nono sure, thanks so much again!” He gave him a slight smile.

“Shall I pick you up later? Maybe we could go and have dinner…” Seungri said, grabbing Daesungs` waist and then whispering something to him. He kinda started to get rid of Seungris` hold and made a fist but kept his face and smiled at Seungri. I guess they thought that I wouldn´t hear and notice anything because I was being busy with my phone but –

“I will bring him home later!”, I said aloud which caused both of them to stare at me. What?? Why did I say that. I don´t know. Maybe I should just keep my mouth shut. Seungri just looked at Daesung who seemed to struggle with his answer. “I…it´s okay, Seungri will pick me up”, he said, biting his lip, and looking down. “But the shooting today will last very long and you probably won´t be awake anymore when we finish.”

“No, I…” Daesung wanted to refuse but Seungri was faster. “No I agree, I need my sleep.”

Nerd.

“Okay Daesung, I will leave now if that´s okay, see you…tomorrow?” He smiled and grabbed his hand. “Y…yeah, if I have time.” “Okay, see you tomorrow Darling.”

Wait. He called him _Darling_? What exactly were they. He needed to be his boyfriend, even though he did not look like he would be affected to other genders, except for his small waist and the way he moved…I don´t know, it didn´t look that manly to say it nicely. He was handsome, for sure, but there was just something very…feminine about him. I needed to ask him although I was a hundred percent sure that he wasn´t going to answer my question. When Seungri had left, he came a step closer to me and looked down, grabbed his right wrist with his left hand and bite his lip. “Please…please don´t ask and please believe me when I say he is NOT my boyfriend and he won´t be. EVER.”                                       

I just gave him a questioning look, raising my eyebrow.

“Well, I guess we are quit then.”

And then, his phone started ringing.

 

_#Daesung_

Good thing my phone had started ringing, because I couldn´t have held this conversation any longer. The stupid I was, I picked up the phone without even looking at who it was. I accepted the call.

 _“ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR MIND?!?”_ , I heard my father screaming on the other end of the line. _“DIDN´T WE HAVE A FUCKING AGREEMENT??”_ He was screaming even louder, which forced me to clearly widen the distance between ear and phone. I had Seunghyun staring in front of me, clearly confused.

Shit Shit shit. I totally forgot work at church. My mind had just been so busy with…other things. I wouldn´t survive this. Ever. And I was not even sure how to apologize or explain.

_“KANG DAESUNG DON´T YOU DARE TO NOT ANSWER ME!”_

“D…dad I´m sorry!”, I cried out silently. “I´m sorry okay? I totally forgot it really!” I could literally hear him exploding on the inside. _“Come here. Now. Oh you´re such a burden. And if you do not decide to come…whatever. It won´t make a change”_ , I could hear him say with a fainting voice and cut off the call. I was a burden, sure. Gosh, how much I hated this family! My shift would end in one hour anyway so honestly, it didn´t make sense to go now anyway. At least this model job here brought me money and was kind of fun.

 

Only one hour later I found myself in a super cosy outfit combined of a simple sweater and sweat pants and again, without makeup. I slowly started to get used to wearing no makeup at all. The shooting itself lasted at least four hours, if not longer. And yes, I noticed Jiyongs eyes resting on me almost all the time. I mean how should I have not -  it had been too obvious. Then, all of a sudden, Jiyongs phone rang.

“Okay, short break!” And he went out.

Still sitting on the sofa, Seunghyun hushed over and sat down next to me and just looked at me with a questioning and worried face. He looked admittedly good, even though he looked so tired.

“Are you okay?”, he asked me, looking straight into my eyes. Honestly? No. I was not okay.

“Yes”, I answered but avoided looking into his eyes directly.

“You´re lying.”

“What?”

“You´re lying. You´re biting your lower lip again. You do that when you´re nervous or lying.”

What. How…I didn´t get him. I mean I hadn´t even noticed myself. Why was he even so interested in me, my life, my well-being? Admittedly, I was a bit touched that someone else except for Youngbae cared for me, like… it indeed made happy. But I didn´t want anyone to ask me questions or know about me. I hated it. It made feel uncomfortable and made me feel weak.

“Why should that be in your interest.” I stated plainly.

I saw a little expression of pain crossing his face and my heart stopped for a moment.

“Daesung please, just tell me. It´s always good to tell someone.”

“You´re wrong and besides, you´re my boss. You shouldn´t care for my problems at all.”

“That´s how I do work Daesung. I care, is it that much of a burden?” Was it? I don´t know. No.

“Yes.”

What was even wrong with me, I mean look at me. There is someone that actually cared and I just pushed him away. But it would be the best for him to not know about me nor getting involved in my life at all.

“And don´t feel bothered with taking me home tonight, I will ask…”

Yes, ask whom. Youngbae? He was out of the city and moreover busy with his new girlfriend. Seungri: not even an option. Jiyong? Well, Jiyong would be an idea but that would be way too random. And that´s…it. I mean Youngbae was coming home in the middle of the night but I could wait for him. Yes, sounded good.

“…Youngbae. He said he´s coming back earlier so it should be fine.”

“Daesung.”

“No, Mr. Choi, no.”

He breathed in sharply. „Seung....”

“We´ve got work to do, right?”

“Guys!! Or well...Seunghyun! I got good news! Sunmi…“

Upon hearing that name, his eyes flung open and I saw a smile brighter than the sun.

“She agreed on at least working as a model again, sooooo I don´t need to dress up as a girl!” He grinned.

What. Okay I would not even dare to ask. So, I needed to work with another model. Female model. I mean I hadn´t barely touched a girl, right? So…they would tell me. And it was time, really. It was pathetic that I hadn´t even kissed a girl yet. One time I was about to do so but my mom had interrupted us, grabbed her wrist, and abandoned her out of our house and since then… I wonder what she has been up to lately, I mean it has been over 5 years now. However, I would need to do this anyways.

“So I have to…model with her or her alone or….?

Both looked at me in surprise. “Of course with her! If you prefer men that´s okay b…”, Jiyong smirked at me, with Seunghyun just beating his ribs. I sighed. “Okay, I really need to clarify: I am not gay or bi or anything.”

Jiyongs smirk grew even bigger. “They all say that, believe me honey.”

“Well, but I say it and I mean it.”

“How many girl have you kissed or had slept with huh?”

“Oh, there are various”, I lied, not noticing that I looked down and bite my lip again until it was too late. Seunghyun would know, he would notice. Please just – I felt his gaze on me and our eyes met. I mean how could I have explained that my family had been treating me like a prisoner for years and even when I ran away they would have found me.

“See Jiyong, everything´s fine. No need for your endless interrogations", he said fiercely and sat down next to me again.

“So you wanted to know whether you´re gonna have a photoshoot with her right? You will, if you want it or not.”

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

 

I don´t know why Jiyong just couldn´t keep his mouth shut. Seriously. Even IF, I mean it wouldn´t make a difference…okay it would at some point, but still. We could not lose him.

“It was just a question. Whether I would need to work with her or not, that´s all I wanted to know", he said, clearly annoyed but did not speak any further. Damn, she would come back. Well, that did not mean that Sunmi still loved me but still, there was at least a chance! “When is she gonna come over?”

“Well, as soon as we need her. It´d be perfect tomorrow”,  Jiyong stated.

“Cool, let´s do it tomorrow then!”, I grinned. Seriously, I could hug the whole world right now. Hearing a clear sigh I turned towards Daesung. “Are you okay with that Daesung?”

“Sure. Where?”

“We will send you the location, we still need to discuss some things”, Jiyong smirked, looking at me and giving me a wink. Ha, nope. For now, I was not going to do anything that would interfere with my probable future relationship with Sunmi, no. I mean, there must had been a reason for her to come back and I was going to use this chance. When Jiyongs´ phone rang all of a sudden, he went out of the room and I was left alone with Daesung again. Funny. Sometimes I would just forget that he was still here, but then he suddenly started to speak. “T…. thank you, Mr. C...” – “Seunghyun”, I grinned at him warningly.

“Seunghyun then. Thanks, Seunghyun", he said with a slight smile.

“Why are you so nervous! I mean you called me Seunghyun before, so why are you that shy?”

With his eyes widening a bit, he just looked at me with the startling face he usually had when I did something unexpected. It was still…cute.

“I…I don´t know. I mean you´re my boss after all.”

“And Youngbae is too”, I grinned. He probably knew I had won so he just stopped the conversation. It was so hard to have an ongoing conversation with him, like… Kang Daesung, you´re a very strange person.


	4. That Other Woman

_I´m so sorry, I didn´t know what was going on. If I´d only have known…but it´s too late._

 

 

_#Daesung_

 

I was so dead. Tomorrow morning was going to be hell. Fucking hell. And no, I was neither bi nor gay. And yes, I had never kissed a girl before. Yes, I was forced to do this fucking job and yes, I never went studying like I wanted to. I never had more than two "friends" and my social life sucked. Yes, I had a shitty childhood. Yes, I was ugly and yes, I never travelled or had real fun. Yes, my life had sucked and still sucked and I didn´t know where to even stop continueing on what sucked.

My whole life was a fucking joke, but I wasn´t laughing anymore.

It was cold, I was alone, I left my jacket inside, it was dark, I didn´t have money and Youngbae was going to arrive in like 6 hours. And no, I was not going to ask for help, they might have already left or fucked each other or whatever. I cannot believe I just thought that. Well, they might be though.

Welcome to my life.

“Coffee?”, I heard Seunghyuns´ dark voice softly asking from behind.

“I prefer tea.”

“Well, that´s why I brought you tea. Only milk, no sugar”, he grinned and sat down next to me, giving me a hot cup of tea. Gosh, that was amazing. Wait.

“Thanks”, I said without looking at him. And silence. I could hear him breathing slowly, the cold causing clouds to form.

“Why are you doing all of this.”

“Bringing you tea, saying hi, asking if you´re doing well…wow, I´m amazing huh?”

“Yes.”

“That was sarcasm”, he said, obviously surprised by my answer.

“But mine wasn´t.”

“I´m not amazing Daesung, I´m everything but amazing. I just brought you tea.”

I just laughed sadly. “The first one who ever did.”

And then - silence.

It felt like we had been sitting on that bench for hours. At this time of the year it got dark very early, and so did it today. People had definitely decided to stay home today. Well, this area was very lonely anyways, but still. It was freezing cold, so the hot tea did its job too well. When I took a sip, it felt like warm syrup making its way down my throat. What would I do for my warm cosy bed right now.

“So Youngbae said he´s gonna arrive earlier?”

“Mh.” I nodded.

“Daesung?”

“Mh?”

“Are you up for a glass of good wine?”

Now looking at him, I just sighed and smiled slightly. Not sure whether this was a good idea but why should I care at this point. “Yeah, I´d like to.”

 

 

 _#The next morning_ I woke up by an alarm that couldn´t be any more terrifying and annoying. My head was killing me. I must have been so drunk that I had fallen asleep on the sofa. When I got up I felt the pain rushing to my head again. And I couldn´t have been any happier to find pain killers and water on the table next to me. SHIT. What time was it. For god´s sake it was only seven, my heart. Just imagining my father…I got goose bumps at only the thought of it. Finally, I found the alarm and hit it. How come I still remembered to set the alarm yesterday, being as drunk as I had been. Suddenly my phone started ringing. It was a text message from Seunghyun. “ _Sorry that I did not tell you earlier but I had to leave very early. Emergency. Hope you heard your alarm! The taxi must be there soon. You can use everything you want to get ready and also use the clothes I prepared for you, sorry for ruining your shirt. I would have brought you myself but something urgent happened which forced me to go. Oh and btw, I won´t tell anyone, promised!”_

What the heck did I tell him and WHAT the heck did we do. STOP this wasn´t good at all. I had too many things untold which I could have told him. When I got up it felt worse than it ever had after drinking with Youngbae, seriously. Which was – for today – the worst condition there could be. My parents were probably going to notice anyways as they noticed everything.

I looked around for the first time after waking up und I must admit that this was so what of the opposite from what I expected. It was so…normal. Modern, but normal. Even the photo wall which I now noticed showed so much detail and so much love. Looking closer at the photos I only noticed a man next to the little Seunghyun, probably his father, but no woman. Well, there were only a few explanations for that.

“Don´t you need to leave?”

I started and turned around, facing no one else than Seunghyun. Damn, I had totally forgot the time.

“I…I´m sorry I didn´t mean to…”

A sad smile crossed Seunghyuns face. “I will tell you later okay? You really need to leave. I just came back earlier than expected. The cab is waiting outside, I think it would be a bad idea if I brought you.”

I needed to leave. Yes. The silence between us felt so awkward right now. When I was about to turn around he started talking again.

“Daesung, would you like Pasta for dinner today?”

I couldn´t help it but smiled upon his question. “Yeah, why not. And…thank you.” And I grabbed my jacket and went out. I had just said yes and it fucking scared me. This wasn’t good. This wasn’t good at all.

 

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

 

 _“Seunghyun! Could you come over a little earlier? We´ve got so much to do before evening.”_ , Jiyong complained on the other end of the line. I just grumbled something and ended the call. Why was he even awake this early, it was rare. Damn, if I only wouldn´t have drunk that much yesterday. _Well, at least not as bad as Daesung_ I laughed to myself. Aish, this kid. He might have seemed so innocent but he wasn´t. And he might have seemed cold, but he definetely wasn´t.

I went back to the living room where I found two empty glasses and three empty bottles of wine, of which I had admittedly at least drunk two. To be honest, some alcohol was not bad due to the pending reunion with my ex-girlfriend. Today was going to be the day and no one would ruin me this. After cleaning everything up, I went to have an endlessly long bath. As I closed my eyes I noticed how quiet it was this early in the morning. And that even though I lived close to the city centre. When I was younger my dad and I used to live on the countryside, but my mom died when I was four and my dad got a new job in Seoul and now I was here. This flat was quite empty without my dad but I knew that this was the only possibility there was. Sure, I know he did not want to be a burden but if he only knew how much I wanted him here. But what should I do, it was his own will and decision.

When I arrived at our studio Jiyong was already there, preparing everything for the next shooting. I was greeted by a grinning Jiyong who must have had just finished a phone call. “Why so happy?”, I grinned at him mischievously. He probably found a new fuck buddy or whatever since….I was obviously no option anymore. “Can´t I be happy or what?”  “Yes but…I was just asking, never mind.”

After giving me a questioning look he asked, “When is Daesung coming?”

“Youngbae is gonna pick him up, he texted me.”

“So, you´re texting each other privately?”, he asked, raising an eyebrow.

“W…what?” Why the hell was he asking this all of the sudden. “Of course – purely work based. Communication Jiyong, communication.”

“Okay…you know there is still Sunmi.” He smirked at me. “And don´t say you´re not like that, you remember the reason for the breakup too well.”

“Jiyong, why are you like this suddenly. I made a mistake. And I regret it. And now she gave me a second chance. Which I really appreciate. So please stop making assumptions of my love life and feelings please. Even IF - it´s not your business.” That look on Jiyong´s face was precious. He is not used to being talked back to like this. But it´s his fault after all, I mean why was he even that interested in my relationship with Daesung. Okay, yesterday did not count, seriously. Still, he knew exactly that I loved Sunmi, still. And today, everything would be the same as a few months ago. Suddenly I heard footsteps and two voices coming closer. I did not notice that Jiyong had left the room already. It was Sunmi. When our eyes met for the first time – yes, admittedly it felt awkward- but then she smiled. And I almost melted away. I would have never thought my heart could beat faster the first time I had kissed her. “Seunghyun”, she said with her usual calm and soft voice. “Sunmi, how…how have you been?” My voice was shaking so much.

“Fine...fine.” She smiled shyly. She looked stunning. As always. I mean leather ALWAYS made something with me to be honest but well that didn´t belong here right now. “And you?”, she asked and sat down on the sofa. “Fine.” And she nodded. Both of us nodded. I then took all of my courage to go and sat down right next to her, especially as Jiyong had left the room again.

 “So…do you have a new boyfriend or…”, Sunmi now looked at me. “Seunghyun. Honestly, the last weeks without you were so hard and even though I should be in the mood to beat you up…well I still am but I also wanna hug you and never let go ag-“ And we kissed. Her lips on mine – the best feeling ever. Damn, how much I had missed this. I deepened the kiss by pulling her closer – and she followed my movements. This woman was driving me crazy – once again. But she could drive my insane as much as she wanted, this time I was not going to disappoint her. We were interrupted by a door being closed slowly but there was no one. Sunmi and I just stared at each other and smiled. Yes, we smiled. “Up for dinner tonight?”, I asked with a wide.

“Always.”

“I Have missed you so much. Sorry for everything I have done but-“ She interrupted me by putting her finger on my lips.

“Let´s not talk about that anymore, alright?”, she whispered. And we kissed and we smiled at each other for felt hours. Checking the time, I noticed how late it already was. Daesung was probably also there. “Sorry darling, we have work to do right?”

“Ah right! Let´s go.”

But when we went to the studio room no one was there yet. Well, except for Jiyong. “He is not here yet. I really don´t understand cause he has never been late.”

Sunmi seemed to be quite startled. “Your shooting-partner.” Jiyong stated, “And please hold back a bit, he is new and he seemed to have never touched a woman.”

“Ah so he is gay, bi whatever?”

Not again this discussion. I would defend him but how was I gonna do this if I knew better? Jiyong was admittedly right. “Yes”, I answered and could slap myself the next second. Jiyong, obviously confused, just gave me a judging look but did not say anything further. Shit. Following my thoughts the door opened and a completely frozen Daesung entered the room.

“Sorry for being late but –“, he apologized and then bowed to us several times.

“It´s okay”, Jiyong smiled, “next time just try to come in time, it can happen.” Woho, what had happened to Jiyong. I crossed the room and walked over to Daesung. He seemed to be totally frozen, I mean, it was like minus ten degrees outside and he did not have a jacket. But he had when he left this morning, I am sure. “Daesung, you´re completely frozen! I thought Youngbae would pick you up…” Avoiding my eyes he just mumbled something which I could not understand. And then he smiled at me.

“We have work, right? Ah you must be Sunmi, I have heard a lot about you.”

Had he? Obviously yes.

Jiyong and I gave both of them introductions and told them the concept of today which was simple: girlfriend and boyfriend. I´m telling you Daesung´s face was memorable.

“You guys did a good job with the new collection. It´s so…real.” Sunmi said and looked into the mirror.

“Well, that´s our concept. What are designer clothes that you see on a catwalk if you cannot really wear it otherwise- Okay so both of you come a bit closer okay? Daesung, please lay down and Sunmi on top of you, act as if you would be playing around.” But despite of how often we had tried, it did not really work out. Daesung was just…to reserved and Sunmi did obviously have a problem with him. Alcohol would definitely help at this stage.

“Seunghyun, Sunmi, change positions please.”

“What?!” I saw surprise in Sunmi´s eyes - but pure panic in Daesung’s. I helped Sunmi getting up and kneeled on Daesung. This must look so weird actually. “Daesung, now spread your arms. And now, Sunmi would do…this”, I said while grabbing his arms and pretending we had a playful fight. When grabbing his arms I saw pain crossing his face. Wait. “Okay, at least like this, see? But let´s continue after a break.” I ordered and told Daesung to follow me to our office. Not even talking back he followed me and I closed the door behind us. “Daesung, tell me what´s up.”  “It´s nothing”, he mumbled and looked down. 

“Daesung.”

“IT´S NOTHING OKAY?”, he shouted back, now looking at me. “Just go back to your precious Sunmi and live your carefree life.” I couldn´t held my myself back and grabbed his shoulders. The moment I touched him he screamed quietly out in pain but I didn´t care.

“Daesung, talk to me. You came here, all frozen even though you told me Youngbae would pick you up. Then you just acted as if nothing had happened. You did not wear your winter jacket even though it was freezing cold and you had it this morning. Then you´re as reserved as you´ve never been before and then this painful face whenever someone touches you. And when I sat on top of you you weren´t even refusing or whatever. So, what happened Daesung, please tell me. And you were the person that came in and went out immediately again, weren’t you.”

“C…could you please let go. It hurts.”

“Of course.” And I let go. “But please tell me Daesung.”

When he looked up to me, I could tell my heart broke into a thousand pieces. I know he hated me for being like this. I knew it. But he suffered and I saw that. And there couldn´t be that many reasons actually.

“I can´t tell you. Please understand me.”

“Dae-“ I again wanted to grab his arms but he winced again. I had enough. I grabbed his shirt as fast as possible and took it off so that Daesung couldn´t even defend himself. I know this was rough and hard but it felt right. What I then saw made me breathless for a moment. His upper body was covered with bruises and hematomas and I didn´t even want to dare to look at his face now.

“This means no spontaneous shirtless Daesung actions today?”, I asked, which caused a slight smile in his face.

“I guess not.”

Silence.

“It´s not as bad as it looks, believe me. A few days and it will be gone-“

“These Daesung. These bruises will be gone. The _visible_ ones.”

“I´m okay, really.”

“I know. You always are.”

“I´m not.”

“Then stop acting so.”

“Then you please stop acting as if you would care for me", he said, lowering his voice a bit. Did he really say that? Did he? Just when I was about to talk back Sunmi called for us. I knew where these bruises were coming from.

“Okay Daesung, two choices. We can call it a day and I will end this shooting immediately OR we can just pretend that this has never happened and we continue our shooting with you standing the pain for the next hours and pretending that you´re okay. Which you´re obviously quite good at.”

“Second.”

“Great. But you better do a good job.”

  
“Don´t worry, I will.”

 

 

 

_#Daesung_

 

Why the hell was I like this. Why did I push people away as soon as they cared? I mean, I always complained that no one ever cared and now there is Seunghyun and I treated him like this. But it was better this way. This was probably just a phase. Now that he was back with Sunmi, why the hell should he still care for me? I felt so useless. So…ashamed. And hurt. And everything hurt so much. I didn´t remember for how long I´d been lying on the floor and waiting for everything to be over. The wouldn´t stop. I did not even scream. I had just kept quiet. Even if I would tell Seunghyun, what could he do? Exactly: Nothing at all.  Just look at Youngbae: he knew but he couldn´t do anything.

“Daesung do you really want to…” Two big brown eyes just stared at me sadly which almost broke my heart.

“I know you´re worried but I need go on and there is nothing the both of us could do.”

“Well, there is b….”

I just shook my head and sighed deeply. “Please just forget what you have seen.”

Despite of that, I didn´t want to drag him down by sharing my problems with him. He looked so happy when he talked about her. When he just talked WITH her an hour before. Every time her name had fallen. How much I wished I could be her- stop. Bad thoughts out.

When we came back, both of them had already been waiting impatiently. If they´d have found out…I had been robbed. By a gang. That sounded brave at least. But they did not ask the next few hours and I was more than happy about that. I tried my best to hide my pain as much as I could and it actually worked out. However, touching a woman was admittedly very difficult for me, and I didn´t know why. Maybe because I never really had before.  So, I did not even know how to touch women like…I had no clue at all. There might have been another explanation for me never having touched a woman but I didn’t really want to think about it. THAT would be my own death sentence.

In the end I survived the whole shooting somehow even though I noticed that Sunmi didn’t really seem to like me that much, as if she would…be disgusted of me. Seemed like most people were, so where was the problem.

“Okay guys, this was the last shot for today, good job everyone!”, Jiyong said cheerfully and started packing his stuff. Sunmi immediately got up and walked over to Seunghyun and grabbed his hand. God, he looked so happy.

“So, where are we going Seunghyunie?”, she asked in the cutest way possible. I was about to puke. “I don’t know, I mean we could go to my place and…cook?”, he smirked. “But we could also skip that part and go on to the dessert first”, he said with his deep voice, grabbed her by the wrist and leaned down to kiss her, which did not seem to be in favour of Jiyong. “Go and get a room the two of you”, he grumbled and made his way towards me. “Hey Daesung, what are you up to tonight?” Was he talking to me? Wow.

“Well, I was supposed to go out for dinner but…”, I laughed sarcastically, now directing my face towards Jiyong. “But…? However, up for a drink?”

“No, I´m going to meet up with...another friend, sorry.” If Seungri was what you could call friend. He had texted me to meet him later this evening before I came here anyways, so I wouldn’t be a bother for Seunghyun who seemed to have forgotten me anyways. I could earn some money and I could at least make someone happy.

“Oh alright, I gotta get drunk alone then. See you tomorrow?”, he grinned at me. “Tomorrow? I thought I was off! But tomorrow morning I´m free, right??”, I almost panicked but tried to stay calm so he wouldn’t have noticed. “Nono, I´m gonna text it to you later. So, see you.” And he went out. Again, I was reminded that the other two had disappeared already, probably still somewhere in here. I now went out to wait outside and sat down at the stairs to wait for Seungri. Why was it so fucking cold, seriously. If they would have only not taken my jacket this morning... How much I hated the winter. And everything else. A couple went by, walking hand in hand, wearing couple scarfs, and of course, he was feeding her sweets or whatever. “I could puke, seriously”, I grumbled to myself and tried to warm my hands between my thighs. “Not in for cute stuff, huh?”, Seunghyun said from behind and sat down next to me. “Why weren’t you waiting inside?”

“I don´t know, I needed fresh air”, I almost whispered without looking at him.

“I see.” Silence. “Look Daesung, earlier…”

“Thank you. For keeping silent.”

“Can´t you just t….”

“No Seunghyun, there is nothing more to tell. Enjoy your dinner with Sunmi and I won´t be any bother tonight.”

He wanted to answer but closed his mouth again. I would like to tell but I just couldn’t. And didn’t want to. Why the hell was I like this!

“Take my coat at least”, he silently said and put his coat over my shoulders. _This man._ “T…hank you.”

“So, what are you going to do tonight?”

Was he seriously asking me? Before answering, I just laughed sarcastically and looked at the ground. “I was supposed to have pasta tonight, but he might have forgotten me so I´m waiting for a friend to pick me up.” Now that I was looking at him in return I saw a slight trace of sadness crossing his face. He really seemed to have forgotten it already but actually, it hadn’t surprised me. Just when he was about to answer I continued.

“Don´t be sorry, I know how happy you are to be back together with her and I see how happy she makes you, so enjoy it”, I smiled at him, honestly, and I expected him to talk back, but he just put his hand on my shoulder and smiled at me. “Thank you, Daesung and…take care.” Now, also Sunmi came out and locked the door.

“Ready?” Seunghyun smiled and held his hand out to grab her hand. “Yes, sure. Nice to meet you, Daesung!”, she smiled at me before sitting down in his car. Her smile. It was so fake. She hated me. I would bet my life on that. She was nice, no doubt but…well, in the end there was no need to be friends with her so: whatever. We would never be friends and that was okay. 

Right then a car was stopping right in front of me: Seungri. Great. I slowly got up and sat down in the front seat. A smiling Seungri was awaiting me inside. “Sorry Daesung, I´m late…”

“It´s okay”, I answered dryly and looked at him. He looked very tired as if he hadn´t slept much the last days. “How are you?” I tried to smile.

“Fine but…you don’t look okay, Daesung.”

“No, I´m fine, thanks for picking me up.”

“You look frozen, wanna drink a coffee?”

He was only planning to drink a coffee, thanks god. I just nodded and hoped for him not to continue talking. It was already late so there weren’t many people outside. Nights in Seoul were actually amazing. I loved to just go out during the night, to take a walk or go out for a drink. At night, all problems seemed to disappear. Now snuggling deeper into Seunghyun´s jacket, I noticed he was wearing a light perfume; it smelled so nice. Closing my eyes, I imagined how much nicer it would be to spend the evening with him rather than with Seungri, but no, life was against me once again. The two of them were probably doing whatever right now. Stop. Why would I even be interested in what Seunghyun and Sunmi were doing, it should have been completely out of my interest. Yes, exactly, he could do whatever he wanted, as long as he was happy with it.

Ten minutes later I found myself sitting at a small table in the corner of a café nearby. “Here, your coffee”, he smiled and placed the hot liquid in front of me. I thanked him, even though I did not really like coffee. I couldn´t help but think of Seunghyun who would have definitely brought me t- why the hell was I thinking of him again.

“How…was your day?”, I asked Seungri who was just sitting there, unusually quiet. “I don´t know, fine I guess…yours?”

“Fine”, I lied and took a sip of the coffee. There was no chance I would tell him what had happened this morning – never. How much I´d like to go home right now, sit on the couch, watching random shows with Youngbae, with a cold beer and some of my favourite snacks. 

“Sleep with me.”


	5. A Bad Day

“Sleep with me,” he now said with a fierce voice just when I was about to swallow, which almost made me choke.

“What.”

I should have known. I should have known I when he had started to come closer and get touchy. Why did he even dare to ask – no, to **tell** me to sleep with him.

“Seungri, I thought we set clear rules in our contract.” I tried to stay calm but he didn´t make things easier.

“I know Daesung but…I mean I would pa-“

“You know that´s called prostitution and that´s not my business and it won´t ever be.”

“Daesung just one time and as soon as you´ll start to feel uncomfortable we will stop.”

Hah. “Great, that would be rape otherwise. And I already feel uncomfortable, thanks.”

I didn´t mean to be rude but I just couldn´t. What did he expect? He had asked me to sleep with him. Yes, I offered myself for money but in another manner. Could the day become worse? Probably not. Despite of that, I was still a virgin. I had never…and especially with a man, but I would never tell him. Fact is: I would not have sex with this man. And not for money.

“Daesung you are going to regret it, believe me.”

“Not really, because I simply don´t want to. I really liked being with you but now that all of a sudden.”

He now seemed to hesitate a bit and looked down, seeming all nervous. I had kind of expected such a thing already but it didn´t suit him. However, people are not always what you expect them to be and I guess one needs to accept that. All of a sudden, he breathed in sharply and looked at me: “Does it have something to do with your boss, this Seung…whatever his name was?”

“Seunghyun. B…but, no what should the fact that I don´t want to sleep with you for money has got something to do with MY BOSS,” I answered raising my voice, admittedly a bit angry and annoyed.

“See? Just by how you react. You even wear his coat! Daesung, it´s just you´ve changed since you m-“

“I think it´s better if I go home now.”

“But…Okay. Should I bring you home?”

“You said you found my purse, right? I can take the subway home. Or take a walk, I need to free my mind. I´m sorry.”

He hesitated for a moment, but then gave me my purse. The only thing I wanted to do right now was to leave this place. I couldn´t believe what had just happened. I said goodbye and left the café as fast as possible. It was a lie when I had said that I ever found Seungri sympathetic or especially nice, but it had never gotten to a point where I had found him this strange. All of a sudden I felt a piercing pain in my head. Worse than it had been all day since…since this morning. Hope tomorrow would be better. Tomorrow there was no reason for them to do so; at least according to me. 

The subway was overcrowded at this time, even though most people must have had already finished work hours ago. Okay, probably because it was unusually cold outside, and it was too easy to become sick. Thanks god I had Seunghyun´s coat. Seunghyun. Again. Why couldn´t he just leave my thoughts alone for a few minutes.But still I smiled. And I couldn´t really help it.

I saw an elderly lady making its way through the crowd. Some other people just grunted and no one offered her a seat so I got up to offer her mine. She thanked me and smiled at me. “Someone seemed to have had a good day compared to others here.”

“Actually, it was one of the worst days I´ve ever had.”

 

________

When I came back I already saw Youngbae´s pair of shoes standing in the hallway – thanks god he was back. “I´m back!” The TV was running; he must have been watching his super trashy alien science fiction movies.

“Oh hey, you´re back”, he welcomed me with a bright smile and pressed the pause button.

“You´re wasting your time watching this”, I grinned at an obviously offended Youngbae. He knew discussions were useless so he just continued asking: “Yah! How was your day?”

Shitty.

“Guess there were better ones actually. New model partner aka Seunghyuns girlfriend, meet up with Seungri and I slept late and didn´t show up at work yesterday but today and you know…but hey, I got my purse back!”, I grinned sarcastically.

“Oh. Bad?”

“Wanna see?”

“It´s okay…you´re okay?”

“…guess so. Depends on how you would define okay. How was your trip?”

“Nahh, nothing worth telling. You know I rarely see my parents and they were dragging me to meet my new girlfriend and so we went there. Don´t ask. But you went shopping, nice coat. Seems like you have gained some style.” If I would tell him that it was…whatever.

“Ahahahahaha, it´s Seunghyuns.” Too late.

“Oups. Sorry, you know I love you dude.”

“I know my style sucks. But…this morning they took my jacket before they sent me home and Seunghyun was too nice to give me his. That´s it.”

An extremely sceptic Youngbae now raised his eyebrows and gave me that judging face. Whatever he was gonna say-

“The "they-took-my-jacket" part doesn´t even surprise me but for the last part: Sure, and next you tell me that you´ve just slept over because he was ´too nice´.”

How did he – Whatever, yes, I had slept over but only because I had drunken too much, and I had slept on the couch and nothing had happened. “Okay, your face says more than words ever could. Don´t tell me you…”

“He has got a girlfriend. I am neither bi, gay or in love and I was having a bad day and we just enjoyed some wine last night. Despite of all, he is a client. And he just got back with his ex-girlfriend. You should have seen his face when he was talking about her. Believe me Youngbae, nothing happened. And: I´m hungry and you must be too, I´m gonna cook us something nice. Hey Sammy!” I kneeled down to cuddle him which resulted in a wet kiss, and I grinned to myself and sighed. Taking a look into the fridge I sighed again but out of frustration. Our fridge represented the typical cliché of a men-only household, seriously. However, I found something in the end, prepared the dinner and brought it to the living room.

“You actually cooked? What the hell…”, Youngbae grinned and helped me to bring the dishes. “Sooo, Seunghyun and y-“

“Nothing. Why do you insist on Seunghyun, huh?”, I asked clearly annoyed but suddenly grinned unwillingly.

“Ha! You´re smiling like an idiot…”

“Okay I admit, I MIGHT think of him more than I´d like to, and yes I MIGHT find him attractive and nice and... Why am I even talking to you.” Whatever, whether he knew or not, he would have found out at some point anyways.

“Youngbae, it´s not that I´m in love or anything it´s just…I don´t know. Please Youngbae, if my parents find out – What they did to me this morning was only because I forgot to come to church and work, Youngbae.”

“Don´t worry Daesung, trust me, I won´t”, he said quietly and patted my shoulder which made me cry out in pain. “Oh sorry Daesung!”

“It´s okay”, I sighed, "let´s eat.”

After cleaning everything up, I decided to go to my room to get some rest. The earlier I would sleep, the earlier this awful day was going to end. But – would tomorrow be better? Probably not. There was work, my parents. Seungri who wanted sex, and the shooting with Sunmi and Seunghyun and all that lovey-dovey stuff. What might they be doing right now…well the answer was obvious from what they had been doing when I left the studio. I was happy for him. I really was, but to be all honest, I couldn´t have been any sadder when Seunghyun forgot that we were supposed to go out for Pasta tonight. It´s understandable, totally, and I would probably have been the same but…it had just hurt me. The only thing I wanted was to get him out of my head. That´s all. It´s just that I had been knowing this man for nearly a week now only and he cared more for me than almost all people did that I´d been knowing all my life. And he made things with me that I couldn´t explain. And even worse, things with my body which I actually could explain. Damn this.

_________

The other morning, I woke up by this terrifying alarm clock sound at six in the morning and got up immediately, as it already had happened that I had fallen asleep again when I had kept on staying in bed- That´s also why I was always setting at LEAST five alarms in a row. Youngbae hated me for that – completely understandable. I quickly got under the shower and for today, I never wanted to get out again. If only my phone would have kept quiet, wait: who the hell would call me at around six in the morning. I grabbed a towel, quickly snitched out of the shower and grabbed my phone, without looking at the person that was calling. It was no one else than-

 _“Good morning”,_ a yawning Seunghyun greeted on the other end of the line. _“Are you awake?”_

 _Seunghyun_. Why was he calling. Why did I even have to be reminded of him early in the morning. WHY.

“Y...yes apparently? And good morning! Did you sleep well?” Did I just ask him whether he slept well or not? Of course he did, or well, depended.

 _“Sure_ ”, he seemed to smile at the other end of the line _“and I will get back to sleep because…let´s say we went to sleep quite late due to circumstances*cough*…however, just wanted to know whether you´re awake.”_

“Haha, yes I´m awake apparently”,  I smiled into my phone like crazy for which I could slap myself again.

 _“And Daesung_?”

“Hm?”

_“Take care please.”_

“I will do my best.”

_“Daesung?_

“Hm.”

_“See you later, okay? Shall I pick you up?”_

“Ahh, nono I´m gonna take the subway, it´s not that far.”

“ _Okay then, see you later.”_

“See you later…and thank y-” Before I finished the sentence he hung up. Okay, why the hell had he called me. I mean, he had woken up at six just to call me even though his girlfriend was with him. For someone like me. It was rarely the case but I´d never been this touched. This man.

Looking into the mirror, I saw the bruises covering my upper arms and body and I must admit that I had looked better before. My eyes looked tired, my skin horrible, short: I looked shitty and even if, I would never look good. Well. My body might do and looking at Seungri I could go for Mr. Korea, however looking at Youngbae, Jiyong and Seunghyun- god Seunghyun! To be honest, he was the most gorgeous person I had ever seen, which is also why I wondered that he didn´t go in front of the camera himself. And when he was making out with Jiyong back then- Stop. Stop, stop wrong direction Daesung, wrong direction. I quickly turned on the water tap to splash cold water on my face and supported myself on the wash basin. With a heavy sigh I looked down on the floor and once again, I was clearly reminded that I was naked. Thanks brain.

 

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

 

When I crawled back into my bed I hoped that Sunmi hadn´t woken up but she proofed otherwise. As soon as I laid down she snuggled closer and faced me. “What did you do?”

“Nothing, go back to sleep honey”, I smiled at her and took her back into my embrace. Gosh, how much I loved her. This time, I would not let her go again, at least not as long as she wanted to stay.

“I love you”, I whispered softly, but she had probably already fallen asleep again. Indeed, I didn´t really want her to tell that I had called Daesung, as I had seen how sceptical she was when it came to Daesung. She kept on asking questions about him and even his love life. She probably didn´t want me to find out, but it must be jealousy somewhere and…fear. I mean I had betrayed her with a man and the way I acted with Daesung and Daesung acted must look suspicious to her and I totally understood. However, there was no reason to give her more reasons to worry so that´s why it was better for me to keep quiet. It was just that I was so worried Daesung would get up late and…get hurt again, with actually having seen what would happen if he did. Every time I saw him he seemed so sad and weak and it felt like I needed to protect him. The worst was, that I had been knowing this man for not even two weeks. I couldn’t stop worrying and it scared me. But still, he was a puzzle up to now, acting all mysterious and trying show as little of himself as possible. I sighed and got up. Maybe I cared too much but there was nothing I could change about it anyways. Yes, it was early but sleeping was no option anymore.

I went to the fridge and grabbed some milk to make myself a hot chocolate. YES, as a grown up man I should not drink it every morning but whatever, it had its reasons anyways. Moreover, it has been the coldest winter in ten years and it felt so good. And to be honest: chocolate was amazing. I now sat down on the window sealing in the living room, which was still my favourite place in here. My dad and me used to observe people and speculate about their jobs. It might sound strange to others but I swear we had the fun of our lives. I saw a woman who couldn’t stand the icy street and fell. Ouch. I chuckled a bit at her startled face. Yes it´s mean but- no one of the other passengers passing by helped her. Idiots. When I took a sip of the creamy hot liquid it felt so good. I saw another woman who was defnietly in a hurry – and slipped. Just when I thought there was again no one to help her a man approached he and helped her with getting up and collecting her stuff. There were still good people out there, thanks god. Funny, that guy had exactly the same coat as me. Wait. I made it myself. And that hair. I could only see that guy from the back but I was a hundred percent sure it was-

“Come back to bed, mh?”, she came over and gave me a light kiss, me having my eyes glued to the street.

 “I don´t know, don´t feel like it. I thought you wouldn’t notice, sorry darling.”

 “What are you looking at?”

“Nothing”, I lied and smiled silently. Sunmi being curious also looked at the street and obviously found my object of observation.

“Oh, okay I see”, she said in a tone I couldn’t identify and left. In the meantime, that man on the street had picked up all her stuff up and gave her his cup with…coffee, or probably tea, and left, running. That wouldn’t turn out well. The woman looked after him, smiled, but then continued going her way.

Sighing, I got up and crawled back into bed next to Sunmi again. She immediately came closer and snuggled deeper into me, but I couldn´t stop thinking and grinning like an idiot. And like that, I fell asleep again.

When arriving at the studio later, only Daesung had arrived and Sunmi would arrive later as she still had something to do. He leaned on the front door, had earphones in and had his eyes closed. I must admit that my coat looked quite good at him, especially that royal blue. I stepped right infront of him and hold his tea right infront of his face. When he opened his eyes it was not exaggerated to say that he seemed shocked to death.

“Are you crazy??”, he said raising his voice a bit, and I could not help it but chuckle at his reaction. “Here, I think you haven´t had the opportunity to drink it this morning”, and gave him a hot cup of tea.

“N…no, how did you kn…thank you”, he smiled and took the tea without any hesitation.

“Are you okay, Daesung? Something happened?”

“No, nothing happened, don´t worry.”

“You look good in that jacket.”

“What? Oh! Sorry for wearing it today, it´s just I was a bit late and grabbed it out of reflex and you can have it now, wa-“ Just when he was about to take off my coat I grabbed his arm to stop him from doing so.

“Keep it please, I can make a new one anytime again, I made this myself.”

“Y…you made this yourself?? Please take it b-“

“Nonono, just keep it please, it looks better on you anyways…okay not better, I do of course look best in it anyways.” Saying that, Daesung couldn’t hold himself and started to laugh all of a sudden.

“Yah! Why are you laughing!”, I said, clearly offended but he kept on laughing until he was crying.

“Sorry it´s just…” He couldn’t end his sentence and started laughing again. "It´s just you defintely would do if you would not have cream all around your mouth." He handed me a tissue and I simply couldn’t help but started laughing as well. “Sorry, I haven’t laughed like this in a while and it´s definitely not funny after all but – " And he started again.

I grinned and opened the door for him. “Let´s go in.”

During the shooting Daesung would start laughing again as soon as I said something, even though it had not been funny. Really! From time to time I noticed both, but especially Jiyong, staring at us sceptically. Regarding Jiyong, he was probably jealous or scared, because it was definitely a fact that he felt, let´s say, sexually attracted to me. Thus, whatever he would see, was not very objective. And honestly, he would most likely fuck Daesung as well and no, I didn’t want to sound rude, these had been his own words. Still, this was all very unlikely to happen as Daesung was not really the type for what Jiyong aimed for. Oh well, that evening when we drank wine…not sure whether he was the type for it, with enough alcohol-

A sudden phone call interrupted my thoughts and I looked at the number of the incoming call. Damn. I picked up the call immediately. “What happened?”

 

 

 

_#Daesung_

 

“What happened?”, I heard Seunghyun asking in panic. “Yes, I understand. I will come immediately.”

Suddenly, Sunmi jumped up next to me and walked over to Seunghyun. “Is…?”

“No, but..”, Seunghyun answered, and something I couldn’t understand. It might have been my imagination only, but I tought I saw a tinge of disappointment crossing her face for a moment. A second later however, her expression changed to a concerned and sad one again.

“I will come with you!”, Sunmi said and clinged onto him which made him smile a little bit.

“Okay guys, sorry I really need to leave, just…change the shooting to the single schedule with Daesung then we will have off tomorrow.” And they left.

This call seemed to have had been important. Why did he have to leave all of a sudden? And why must Sunmi go with him again, clingy like a little cat. In this moment I realized that I would never win against their long and deep relationship. They had been knowing each other for years now and shared such a deep relationship – it was impossible. I really couldn´t recognize myself anymore right now, why would I feel attracted to men suddenly. I don’t want to say it´s bad but in my situation, it was. Maybe it was only Seunghyun and because he cared so much? I didn´t know.

“Daesung!”, Jiyong now said impatiently right next to me. Oh right, Jiyong was still here. “Sorry, I got lost in thoughts.”

“Well, I noticed”, he grinned and put his hand on my shoulder, which still hurt a bit. “But let´s have a coffee before we continue okay?”

“Okay, but I prefer…”

“You prefer tea, I know, Seunghyun told me.” He had told him. That I prefer tea. Why was he everywhere. EVERWHERE. Which I should be happy about, but I just couldn’t as he didn’t make things better but way worse. Both of us grabbed our jackets and Jiyong locked the door behind us. The café he then lead me to was the same one that I went to with Seungri. Oh damn, Seungri. No, I had other problems right now, if you could call Jiyong a problem. For him, I could not really say what kind of person he was. He was nice, no doubt, but still I think one needed to be careful with him; and not to forget the fact that he felt…let´s say sexually attracted quite fast.

“Let me pay”, I said and was about to order, but he insisted on paying himself. “Come on, I invited you so I´m gonna pay. Sit down already.” I did like I was told and waited for him to come back.  I was still curious what had happened that Seunghyun had to leave that quickly because his face had turned pale so suddenly to a point it already scared me. Asking Jiyong would be an option but that simply would have felt wrong.

“Here is your tea, milk, no sugar”, he grinned and sat down next to me. After a moment of silence he started talking again. “You know that you´re doing a great job right?”

“What?”

“Like I said, you´re doing a great job, really. I´m glad we chose you even though I must admit that…I had my doubts first. No offense.”

“It´s okay.”

“No really, but Seunghyun was a 100% sure to choose you and his decisions are usually the best so here we are.”

“Thank you I guess?”, I said hesitantly but with a slight smile. And again, it was Seunghyun who came up, who else.

“By the way, isn’t that his coat? Respect”, he said laughing, taking a sip of his coffee and putting his hand on my thigh. “I asked him to even to sell me this jacket but he never gave it to me. You´re special, YEY”, he grinned sarcastically. Was he jealous? He was jealous. “Are…are you jealous?” Did I seriously just ask that.

“Honestly? Yes”, he admitted and looked down. “I don´t know, I have liked him a lot for a long time now but there won´t be more – ever.”

“Did you ever tell him?”

“Are you crazy? Of course not. That´s not my style and…I don´t know. That´d feel wrong.”

So, he was in love with Seunghyun. Actually in love. Jiyong. I knew that he felt affected in some way but I didn´t know he liked him that much.

“But you´re quite of an interesting person as well”, he smirked at me and placed his hand on my thigh again.

“Jiyong, pl…”

“Sorry, I couldn’t help it”, he grinned and took another sip of his coffee. Not again, please. This café was witched, seriously! But against all expectations, we talked about god and the world from now on, nothing usual or anything and it felt so good to talk to someone without any worries. After a good hour of talking we left the café in direction of the studio and I was glad that Jiyong did not try to touch me again. It was happening from time to time; not that I felt extremely uncomfortable, but he could also keep his hands to himself.

Suddenly I almost stumbled over some useless Christmas decoration. Fucking Christmas, seriously. All these clichés and couples and lovey-dovey stuff and forced family activities – no thanks.  All of a sudden two men approached us, or more Jiyong, and asked for a photo.

“You´ve got fans that notice you?”, I grinned at him.

“Nah, we have only appeared in fashion magazines so far, and as we´re designers only our faces rarely appear anywhere. This does not happen often”, he grinned shyly, and I gave him a hit on his shoulder. “I´m turning red already Daesung, let´s go back to work huh?”

The rest of the shooting went on smoothly, but Seunghyun and Sunmi never came back. I was still asking myself what had happened that both of them had left so quickly. Well, Sunmi more or less just being clingy as always. Okay stop. Why was my brain acting all jealous again. Seunghyun loved her unconditionally and she was being a super nice pretty woman, a woman every man would like to date, the perfect daughter in law. Probably studying law or something super social next to her job here. Why was I like this, being all jealous. My mind was filled; filled with Seunghyun all the time. But time would do its job, right? I was not even convinced myself. Wait. Today was Friday and that meant work. Church. Parents. Kill me.

“Jiyong, I really need to leave if that´s okay, I need to work in the evening on weekends-”, I said slightly in panic and putting on Seunghyuns coat, which Jiyong still eyed suspiciously.

“Y…yeah sure, just leave, I´ll text you for the next appointment, okay?”

“Thanks, Jiyong!” I waved at him and left. When I went outside, I got the shock of my life. There he was standing, next to his car.

“What do you want, Seungri.”

“Daesung, please listen to me!” I turned my back towards him and took a step towards the subway station but he wouldn´t let go. “Daesung pl-“ He grabbed my wrist so that I turned around. “WHAT do you want huh?” I didn’t mean to be rude but I just couldn’t help myself and pushed him away.

“We had a contract Seungri.”

“I Know, but…I just thought I could…ask?”

“Ask what.”

“To forgive me. I mean its not that I actually wanted to ask you but at some point I just had to ask you and…”

“Well, that tells me you have at least thought of it. Even if you wouldn´t have asked. Seungri, I don´t know…”

“What about next week? Some time will have passed by and today is Friday so next weekend or whatever.”

I really did not want to. But to get some money together…

“Let me think about it okay?”

His eyes now widening in joy, he approached me and gave me a tight hug. I could free myself quite quickly as he was not that strong to be honest. Looking at the clock I got a shock, said goodbye and hurried to the subway. When I was crossing the last street on a cross walk I ran as quickly as I could. All of a sudden, I heard wheels squealing to my right, which made me jump and fall in shock. I almost got a heart attack when a car passed by me only a centimetre next to in the middle of the street. HELP.

The car stopped right away and an overly troubled man ran right towards me. No other than Seunghyun, followed by Sunmi.

“Are you crazy?”, I heard him almost screaming at her.

“It´s okay Seunghyun, nothing happened”, I tried to calm him down, but useless. Sunmi almost seemed to cry. “I did not see him and the streets are icy, I did my best.”

“Daesung are you okay?? Do you need an ambulance!”

I now tried to sit down at the margin of the sidewalk and it hurt so much. I saw a little blood on the street, it must have been my head. Just…didn’t let him notice. “No, I don´t need one, I´m fine”, I said as confident as I could, ignoring the stabbing pain in my head. I brushed off the snow of my clothes, but I was all wet still. When I got up I thought the pain in my head was going to kill me, but I tried to act all fine and forced myself to a smile.

“Daesung, I´m sorry”, Sunmi said with a whiny voice. “It´s okay, it can happen, don´t worry.” I smiled at her and now approached Seunghyun. “I´m fine, don´t worry. And, I really need to go to work, I´m already way too late.”

“Didn’t you work this morning??”

“Yes but at weekends I´m also working on evenings and today is Friday, so could I pl-“

“Okay, whatever I say, you won´t listen to me anyways”, he said in a way I could not really identify.

“See you tomorrow then?”

“No, like I said, we´re off tomorrow. Well, if you finished today. And you will need some rest, honestly.”

“Yeah, we did. So…see you then?

“See you, and...take care”, he smiled at me and I turned around with fast steps to reach the next train. And of course, I did not. I sat down on a seat next to an elderly woman. The pain in my head was killing me, seriously. And I was frozen all over. Why the hell had she not seen me.  And why did I have go there again. And why was Seunghyun everywhere. And Seungri. And everything. Soon. Soon, everything would be better. But at this moment I thought that I had the right to say that my life sucked.

 

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

 

“But how the heck could you not see him?!?”, I said without noticing that I was already screaming which made her tear up. But seriously! The lights were red and the weather had been fine and I even told her that the lights were red! Only a millisecond and he could have been dead.

“Sunmi, it´s just I don’t understand-“

“He said he is okay, so everything is fine. End. “

“He always says that.”

“Did you ever think about how I felt when I almost hit him? Huh?!”, she screamed with teary eyes and ended up crying and pushing me slightly. When she looked into my eyes I thought I would die and took her into a tight hug. Rubbing her back, I tried to calm her down. “I…I am sorry, I didn´t mean to scream and judge you, really. I was just confused. Do you forgive me?”

“Of course, idiot”, she smiled under tears and got out of my hug. “I will make some coffee. And Seungyhun…are you okay? After the visit?”

“I think so, you know it´s only a matter of time…”, I said sadly, now starring out of the window.

This day was awful. Really.

And to be honest, after today I wondered whether I should ask her to marry me. It´s not that both of us felt like marrying her but I had my reasons. And I mean we had already talked about it. I loved her, she loved me so where was the problem? All these kinds of questions tortured me and sleeping was not even possible. She probably wouldn’t notice if I sneaked out of the bed again, as she was sleeping like a rock, and so I did. I knew that it was freaking cold outside, but I needed some fresh air and the weather was fine. I grabbed my jacket and put on as much clothes as possible and went out. Outside, I breathed in the fresh air and it felt so good. This area was so empty at this time that it was almost scary, okay well, it was almost midnight but still. Plus, this was the coldest winter in years, so only an idiot would go out and here I am. I slowly took one step after another as the streets were to icy – and I had seen all this people slipping out there.

But I didn´t know. Should I really ask her to marry me? We have been knowing each other for years now and yes, there had been a tiny crisis, but we had even survived that. And my dad…he really wanted to see me getting married to a great woman and now that I had the chance I needed to use it. Yes, I would definitely marry-

My thoughts were interrupted when I stumbled and slipped on the icy streets, but to my surprise I never hit the floor. Two hands grabbed my shoulders before falling and helped me up again.

“Are you okay?”

“Daesung?? Yes, of course. Thanks! Damn Christmas decoration.”

“My words”, he grinned and put his hands in his pocket. Smiling at him I noticed the bandage around his head. “Your head-“

“Is okay, a good colleague noticed it and gave me this but I think it is exaggerated any-“ He sneezed and almost slipped.

“You´ll become sick, seriously.”

“You´re exagg-“ And he sneezed again.  “However, what are you doing out here?”

“I needed some air and…I was thinking about something.”

“Well, then I will not interrupt you.” He said hesitantly and looked at the ground. Looking closer at his face he looked so bad. Pale, tired…and sick. “I will…take the next subway now okay?”

“There is no next train, did you ever look at the time? I will drive you home.”

“Shit. Then I will walk, its only 5 stations from here.”

“Daesung, I´m gonna drive you and you better do not say no.”

He now seemed to hesitate for a moment but finally nodded in agreement. We slowly walked back and got into my car. It already seemed like a wonder to me when he even got into my car. After a few seconds he already broke the silence. “I didn´t notice that you live that close to my working place, I just…totally forgot.”

“Well, that was a lot of wine”, I laughed, but his face remained serious. Hopefully he did not remember what had actually happened back then. Or, what he had told at least.

“Whatever I said back then, it was…probably pure non-sense”, he almost whispered, pressing his lips together.

“I hope so.” I wanted to grin but I never did and I didn´t know why but yes, I hoped so. Before we were able to continue our talk, we arrived and I turned off the car.

“We´re there.”

“Mh.”

Silence.

“Thanks for bringing me…Seunghyun.” He smiled shyly and immediately open the door.

“It´s not a big deal Daesung, really”, I smiled, noticing how nervous he was. After a few second he found his voice again.

“Do you wanna get up for a coffee?”

Uhm…did I? Well, why not. On the other hand…Before I could even decide on an answer Daesung seemed to already regret his question.

“Nevermind, it´s probably better if not.”

“Yes", I answered without any hesitation and I thought I saw a sad smile crossing his face when I answered, even though that might have been only my imagination.

“Bye.” He waved at me, quickly closing the car door and heading to the door with as fast as possible.

“I´m sorry”, I whispered to myself, started the motor again and started driving.


	6. Comfortable

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for not having updated in such a long time, but the last weeks have really stressed me out, especially university and family. I never wanted to be that kind of author to let readers wait for such a long time, so I will try my best to not let this happen again. Again, sorry and I hope you´re still with me. Thank you all so much and hope you´ll enjoy reading!

#Daesung

Why the hell had I been so damn stupid. Of course he would say no. Coming up for a coffee? You´re so stupid Kang Daesung, you´re so stupid. Whatever, it was too late now. He had a girlfriend at home that was waiting for him, so why would he have gone up. Okay, it would have been for a coffee only, really. I hadn’t even thought of doing anything else I mean I was…there could only be one reason for what I had done. This was my end. That man would be my end. He was literally EVERYWHERE, and that wouldn’t be different for the next weeks, months, or how long ever this job would take. It was just a phase. It was probably because he cared so much, more than anyone else had ever done and there was going to be a point when he would lose interest. I mean, how long had he been knowing me, not even two weeks? That wasn´t really a lot. On the other hand, that meant that I was now at this emotional stage already after not even two weeks.

Yes, it would be my end. He would be my end.

“Fuck this”, I screamed and kicked some random toy of Sammy who immediately came and looked at me with his big, brown, lovely eyes- Seunghyun.

“ARGH”, I screamed again, which Youngbae had definitely heard.

  
“What the…Daesung, are you okay??”

  
“Do you think it´s nice in Alaska?”, I asked and left to my room, leaving back a completely confused Youngbae.

 

When I woke up the next morning it was still dark and all quiet - no surprise at six in the morning. Even though I was using four blankets I was freezing like crazy which made me snuggle deeper into my bed. Only ten more minutes would be fine.

However, these ten more minutes turned out to be one more hour, and that would hurt someone. Soon. Shit! How the hell could I believe that I would not fall asleep again. I immediately turned on the lights, got dressed and made my way towards the station, at which the train disappeared right before my eyes. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to my life.

“YOU FUCKING BASTARD.” And I found myself lying on the floor once again.  
“You better do your work now, plus five extra hours. I mean our cleaning staff would like an evening off right?”, my father grinned and slammed the door. And then – I couldn’t help it and started crying, with all my heart. It seemed like all of the last weeks were catching up to me right at this moment and I didn’t even protest. Tears were falling, and falling, and falling. The floor felt cold and wet and it seemed like my clothes were absorbing the wetness with every fibre but still I couldn’t force my body to get up.

  
When my phone rang I hesitated for a moment, but it would not stop ringing. By looking at the screen I grabbed my phone, threw it away on which it busted on the wall. Fuck all of this – and tears fell again. The dirty, white walls seemed to choke me all of a sudden. This room was not big, it was full of stuff and chairs and dust and it felt depressing. This room, it felt awful. It would not be the last time for me being here today probably. But I had to get up. And so I did, grabbed my phone and took a step closer to hell in a place that was supposed to be closer to heaven.

  
When I finished it was around 2am in the night. Damn cleaning. Bonus, my phone was probably completely broken, and my clothes still felt cold and damp and dirty. Jiyong and said person had probably tried to call me all day but I was not even sure whether my phone was still working after bursting it on the wall.

  
“Daesung!”

  
There he was. And a few minutes later I found myself on my way home. Once again, in his car.

  
“Daesung, why didn’t you reply to my calls. I was worried!”, he moaned, sounding worried and kind of angry.

  
“Seunghyun please, just leave me alone.”

  
The car stopped in front of Youngbae´s flat and I opened the door as fast as possible to avoid any other unnecessary talk. But instead of driving away, he turned off the motor and got out as well.

  
“Daesung, is your offer still available?”, Seunghyun asked, grinning mischievously.

No, no, NO! This was the last thing I needed right now but…I didn’t want to be impolite.  
“Yes of course”, I smiled slightly and opened the door for him.

  
“Woah, it´s nice here!”

  
“Well, it´s Youngbae´s, I´m too lucky that he let me move in. Just sit down on the sofa, I will bring us something to drink.” Which I found very favourable as I had the opportunity to be alone. While the coffee was cooking I again noticed that tears had started to fall and did not really stop despite of how hard I tried to prevent it. Even though I tried to avoid Seunghyun, he would notice. I wanted to stop. I really did. But my body wouldn’t listen. I tried to calm down as much as possible and wiped my tears away before entering the living room once again.

  
“Thanks”, he said and took a sip of the coffee. “See Daes- Hey, you are crying!”, he noticed, immediately put down his cup and softly grabbed my shoulders which made me turn so that he was now facing me directly, not knowing he was making everything worse right now. “Never mind, I´m alright.” Before I could wipe off my tears, Seunghyun´s hands found their way to do so. His soft touch on my face made my heart skip a beat.

“What happened Daesung, what happened.”  
“Nothing. Really. I just don´t want to talk about it”, I said, still with a shaking voice. He seemed to hesitate but then let go without saying anything further. Not really knowing what to do or say, I then remembered something I had wanted to do or more, wanted to ask. “The days before, you received a sudden call and left with Sunmi all of a sudden…”  
His eyes turned sad and he now looked down. “You must know Daesung…my mom died when I was four and my dad and me…what can I say, we got so close, no one could tear us apart, we were a team you know?”, he smiled sadly. “And then…he got sick, very sick about one month ago.”

  
“…cancer?”

  
“Lung cancer, extremely aggressive.” His voice got thinner and thinner, but he never started crying. “And, when I got that call…it was the hospital and his condition was unstable for a moment.”

  
“So, that man on the photos, in your apartment…”

  
“That´s my dad. It…broke my heart when he first told me. And it is so hard for me to not show my feelings. My dad…told me to live on and enjoy every day we had as if nothing would have happened and to not make it a major part of my life. But it is so hard and-”

“I…I am so sorry. Why did you never tell me?”  
“Because you never asked”, he smiled sadly and took another sip. Ouch, that hurt. It was true – he had been caring for me so much, but… I had never asked him. However, it was way too late now. He had hidden his feeling so well, which would have made it impossible for anyone to notice – if I had just asked. I had been so busy with my own problems that-

  
“How…are you Seunghyun?”

  
“Not fine Daesung, not fine.”

  
To be honest, I was not the most empathetic guy there was, really. I did not know how to deal with those kinds of questions, answers and talks. Silence filled the room, so that one might have been able to hear the snow falling – until something scratched the door. Sammy! Youngbae must have locked him in, so I jumped up and opened Youngbae´s room, where that fluffy thing already awaited me ready to lick my whole face. “Sammy, you´re almost killing me!”, I tried to slowly get rid of his tongue and sat down next to Seunghyun again. And it was more than surprising, that when Sammy first saw Seunghyun, he did not act like he wanted to kill him anytime soon but ran towards him, his tail moving faster and faster and jumped at the sofa and leaned his head on his thigh.  
“I…if you don’t like it you just have to shove him off, he won’t bite or anything.” But Seunghyun didn’t even listen to what I said and looked at Sammy´s necklace.  
“Oh, hell Sammy!”, he almost screamed in joy and cuddled him. What. “Wait. Daesung, how did you get him?”

  
“Well, he had been standing in front of our door two years ago, in the deepest winter, he was almost frozen. We tried to contact his owner, but I don’t know, he was not registered. At least he had contact information on his collar, but no one ever replied to the post, mails or telephone.”  
“Strange. That can´t be, we actually waited for messages all these months, but nothing and…” Seunghyun was now scrolling at his phone like crazy until he suddenly showed me a photo of his dad and Sammy. Wait.

“Seunghyun, was he really yours?”

  
“…yes. Well, ours. But one day he just walked away. I was not at home, but everything was locked so I still don’t get it.”

  
This world was too small, seriously. Why was it his dog; he was everywhere. And this time I meant it. Still, just looking at him, fooling around with Sammy and seeing that smile on his face warmed my heart. Suddenly Seunghyun turned around and took me into a tight hug, almost choking me. My heart was beating faster and faster and the only thing I wanted was him not to notice.

  
“Thank you so much Daesung, for taking such loving care of him”, he almost cried and let go when suddenly Sammy made his way onto my lap. “Jealous huh?”, I said and cuddled him. “Seunghyun, listen you can take h-“

  
“No! Please, please keep him here. He looks so happy and he probably already got used to it-“

  
I grinned. “Definitely, he is always sleeping in my bed but… I still don´t get it. Such a coincidence.”

  
“Indeed. But a good one”, he said and smiled sadly. “But it´s so strange, my contact information were definitely in there. Do you still have the contact data?”  
“Actually yeah, they are in the pendant of Sammy´s collar I guess?” I opened the pendant of the collar and got out a tiny piece of paper with some handwritten data on it. The ink had been fading slightly already, but it was still readable more or less. Looking at Seunghyun´s face while he was trying to identify the written I saw an expression of pure confusion and anger crossing his face.  
“What is it?”, I asked cautiously.  
“This contact information are neither mine nor the one of my dad. And it´s none of our handwritings either. Actually, the handwriting is…no, never mind.”

  
“Maybe someone else found him before us but he ran away once again because he missed home and then stood in front of our door?”

  
Still being in thoughts he slightly nodded but then came up with a smile: “Yeah, probably, that would make sense. Damn it´s that late already? I better go- Shit it’s snowing like crazy.”  
Whatever I was going to say next, I would regret it. “You can stay over if you want, Youngbae won´t probably even notice.” And how I did. To be honest, I saw slight hesitation in his eyes first; he had a girlfriend at home and he was my BOSS. Well, I was living together with my other boss anyway but still, this was anything but normal.  
“It´s almost half past three and I am damn tired so why not, Sunmi will understand.”  
Okay I did not expect that. “You can sleep in my bed. I have to be at work at seven again so I won’t sleep and if, then on the sofa, but you can stay as long as you want, Youngbae won´t come back before afternoon.”

  
“Daesung, that´s not neces-“

  
“No when and but, please. You also look like you need lots of sleep. Plus: I can sleep in Youngbae´s bed.”

  
“Thanks so much”, he now smiled sadly at me. I led him to my room, quickly exchanged bed sheets, just because, and gave him an old shirt of mine which he took thankfully. After wishing good night I stole myself into Youngbae´s room, stripped off my clothes and laid down on his bed. I was supposed to be sleepy after such a day and at this time – but no. Even though this room was huge and the walls light, I felt like choking in here. Everything was so confusing and honestly, nothing made sense anymore. I didn´t know for how long I have been laying here, just staring out of the window and counting snowflakes. After around an hour I gave up and decided to take a shower, as I had to leave for work in not more than one hour anyway.

  
Just when I was about to open the bathroom door, the door already opened and no one else than a half-naked Seunghyun was standing in front of me, causing my heart to stop for a moment. This man was simply unbelievably gorgeous. “Sorry, I had to pee too badly.”  
“Are you apologizing for having to pee?”, I tried to ask with a serious expression, but we both ended up laughing, until, all of a sudden, his expression got serious again. “Daesung, these bruises are new!” Indeed, I had forgotten that I was half-naked as well.  
“Yes, but I´m fine.” He slowly came closer and touched the bruises which did not really hurt anymore but gave me goose bumps all over. “About your father or your parents-“, he started to say, but I interrupted him before he could continue any further. “Seunghyun, please stop. You know nothing about them anyway and it´s better if you won´t ever, so please.”

  
“It´s swollen all over, it can´t go on like this. It hurts by only looking at it”, he said, almost sounding angry and touched the other one, which was way lower than the other one. This was dangerous. I did not only notice my nipples getting hard but especially my southern region of which I hoped he would not notice or let go, NOW. “Seunghyun, I´m fine, I really don´t want to talk about it. Can I just…shower please?”  
“Y...yes, of course”, he mumbled and let go with an expression I couldn’t really identify. God, please didn´t let him notice. But how should he had not; damn I was wearing tight black underwear only, there had been no way to hide it. When Seunghyun had left I closed the door as fast as possible and was more than happy to take a cold shower.

  
When I was done, I remembered having forgotten my stuff in my room. I sneaked in as silently as possible, still hoping Seunghyun had already fallen asleep again. When going out, I couldn’t help but staring at him only for a short moment; he was beautiful, purely beautiful, lying here in my bed which already seemed completely unreal. Taking a step closer, I noticed that Seunghyun was shivering so I grabbed Youngbae´s blanket and covered him once again. He immediately snuggled closer into it and mumbled. “Sun…mi”, and snuggled deeper once again into his blanket, which gave me a sudden stab in the heart. Time would pass. As well as my feelings. But this hope disappeared from day to day and I wasn’t sure how this would end.

 

 

  
# _Seunghyun_  
  
Of course I had noticed Daesung watching me, and yes I had noticed what I had done by touching him. And no, I had not been dreaming of Sunmi when I was mumbling her name. I had been a hundred percent aware of what I had been doing; but I was scared. Scared of what Daesung might feel for me. Scared of the feelings Daesung might change in me, even though I loved Sunmi with all my heart  
The other morning, I woke up with the first sun rays touching my face softly. I had slept the best I had in weeks to be honest. As I was not really keen on getting up already, I snuggled deeper into my pillow. HIS pillow. Whatever I was doing here, it was not right. Yes, it felt comfortable, actually way too comfortable, but this was wrong. On the other hand, we simply got along well and he was someone nice to talk with. It was as simple as that right? Now taking a closer look at Daesung´s room, the way it was furnished was not really lovely or lively. There were no photos, no memorabilia, nothing that said something about his life personality, life, hobbies, past. _Who are you Daesung_?

  
The only thing I saw were some books in a small white shelf in the very left corner of his room of which 90% looked like books that had not been written to entertain people. I could not really read most of the titles from afar but at least one of the books was about…allopathy, whatever it was, and another one about- well, something about medicine. I was disrupted when my phone rang. ´Youngbae won´t come before tomorrow so you can stay as long as you want`  
And another one from Sunmi. `Mom needs my help once again, I cannot come back before tomorrow, she is still inconsolable …sorry darling`  
Ah, so her mom once again. Sunmi´s mom had been so sad when her husband had left her. We had met Sunmi´s mom right after their breakup, and she had been crying for hours and hours and hours and what can I say, both of them were just so close so I couldn´t have stopped Sunmi from visiting her mom anyway even though there was work to do. So, guess today was completely off. No one. And nothing to do. This would be the first complete day off in weeks. With this thought I got up and made my way to the kitchen. My eyes widened in joy when I found pancakes on the table, with some syrup next to it. He must have made them this morning despite of his not even two hours of sleep. I put the pancakes into the microwave and found some hot chocolate…I mean he wouldn´t mind if I made myself some right?  
Probably not, because ten minutes later I found myself sitting on the couch in front of the TV, enjoying pancakes and hot chocolate and watching some random TV shows where they were pranking random people. I didn´t know why I felt so comfortable; it usually took me very long to do so and I wouldn’t have agreed if it wouldn’t have been Daesung. But now? I felt more than comfortable actually. Just when I was about to grab the last pancake, Sammy jumped onto my lap and – it was gone. My last precious pancake. It was gone. Sammy and I - our life-long relationship. That had ended so sudden. Still I forgave him and so he ended up sitting on my lap and watching some random shows with me. I expected to swipe my thoughts off to my dad or Sunmi or work, but nothing.

And some when, I don’t know when, I fell asleep again on the red leather couch with the snow continuing to fall outside. All of this, to be woken up by Daesung six hours later when he slammed the door and slowly took off his all wet clothes.

  
“Seunghyun!”, he surprisingly said when he entered the living room. “Sorry, I didn´t want to wake you up.”  
“Daesung I´m sorry I planned to pick you up and clean up and…fell asleep.” And then Daesung began to chuckle and wouldn’t stop even when he sat down next to me in this…terrifying red armchair. Honestly, the flat was nice but this furniture was a no-go. “Never mind, Seunghyun,” he said with a rough voice all of a sudden, “you can do that now. Oh, help my throat.” He started coughing and left the room.

 

  
# _Daesung_

  
When I came back to the living room after I had changed into some warm clothes, Seunghyun was still sitting at the same spot, however, now having a hot cup of tea in front of him.

  
“How…”

  
“Thought it´s time for a hot tea. And please don’t ask how I found it”, he grinned. “And it´s good for your throat.”

  
“Well, you must have gotten comfortable in here quite quickly”, I laughed, thanked him for the tea and sat down on that arm chair again even though the leather felt like ice when I sat down. Wait, where was my – my eyes shifted to Seunghyun who sat there covered in my blanket - there it was. As he would give it to me soon anyways I did not even ask but waited. Having him sitting here, I couldn’t help taking a short look at him from time to time. He had just woken up but he looked unbelievably…perfect to me. I know nobody was perfect but at least my perfect. Sometimes, when he laughed at something on the TV, he had those tiny dimples, even on his eyes. His laughter reminded me of that of a child – it was pure, and- what the hell happened to you Kang Daesung. Just days ago, I wouldn’t have recognized myself in the mirror, seriously. Well, I could ignore and hide the feelings for Seunghyun as I always did but this time it was…something else. I mean I liked women before, did I? I actually never had that feelings for a woman, but did that automatically make me… gay? Probably not, I don´t know, I was so confused by myself, because this was not me. The usual me would push feelings away and anyone who ever got close to me or my feelings. Yes, Seunghyun was a man and I was aware of that and he was in a relationship but…whatever.

  
“Seunghyun, can I sit over there?”

  
He now looked at me in surprise. “This is your sofa, so of course.”

  
I got up and sat down next to Seunghyun. Okay this felt awkward and I quickly changed my opinion about whether this had been a good idea.  
“Get under the blanket as well Daesung, you´re all frozen and I still don’t think you´re well after all what happened the last days”, he now said with a worried voice and offered me to join him under the blanket. And so did I. We were so close that I was hardly able to breathe properly. And I thought my heart would skip a beat when our hands touched for a second, well, we were sitting arm to arm anyway. Seunghyun however didn’t even seem to notice at all as he was just sitting there, his eyes glued to the screen all time.

  
Ten minutes later Seunghyuns head found its way to lay down on my shoulder. Gosh, how gorgeous he was. Even though the TV was quite noisy, I heard his soft breath right beneath my ear. After one more hour I did not even know what I was watching, I only heard screaming, jigsaws and splashing blood and intestines from time to time. At this time?? Must have been Youngbae´s special TV package thing.  
What annoyed me most with horror movies is that persons tend to cry and complain and not move and then – die. I hated that. “Run idiot!”, I screamed, totally having forgotten Seunghyun was still asleep on my shoulder.  
“What?! When where why-“, Seunghyun screamed, now sitting straight with his eyes flung open. I couldn´t help but chuckle a bit. “Sorry,” I grinned, “I was just complaining about stupid people in horror movies."

  
“Wait. Hor-“

Right now, that person who complained and cried and did not run, got killed by being cut into pieces. Great job dude. Suddenly I heard a scream next to me and Seunghyun pulled the blanket over his head and face, laid down, and hid his face in my lap. In. My. Lap.

  
“What the hell-“

  
“Horrormovies. I hate them”, he mumbled into my lap. This stunned, all grown-up man was afraid of horror movies. I couldn’t help it but ginned like crazy. I decided to be merciful and release him from his nightmare -and mine because he was lying down there with his head is my lap- and switched channels to some random cartoon.  
“Nightmare is over”, I grinned and he slowly got up. Thanks god.  
“Thanks”, he breathed heavily. “What time is it??”  
“It´s five. Sunday, to be more accurate”, I smiled. And Seunghyun smiled back. And then: silence.  
“Daesung, how about you come with me to visit my dad?”   
“Sure, but I need to work tonight”, I told him, not being able to hide my surprise.

It was not more than five hours later when I closed the door of the church community hall to make my way towards the address Seunghyun had given me. Well, seemed like I would not need that anymore.

  
There he was: Waiting in front of his car to pick me up with his typical innocent smile. What was he doing to me. Seriously.  
“My dad and I we both thought it´s quite cold outside.” I walked closer towards him until I faced him directly.

  
“I need to ask you a question”, I began to speak with a thin voice. “Why…are you like that. Being all nice and caring.”

  
His eyes now widened in surprise as response to my question. “Honestly? I don’t know I mean that´s just me. And I like you. And I really appreciate you. And you´re a great person.” His facial expression now got soft.  
“Even though I treated you like…not good in the beginning.”  
“Well, literally I am still your boss, so I could have just fired you. Say, Daesung, why can´t you just accept that I like you huh?”  
I swallowed. I didn´t know. Because people have treated me like shit for two decades. I had always been a burden. To everyone. “Your father is waiting”, I said and got into his car. Following that I only heard Seunghyun sighing.

  
When we arrived at the hospital I was quite surprised. Of course, there were not many people as it was half past ten, however, the hallways seemed friendly and open with lots of flowers and colorful pictures. This was probably because this was not a hospital, but a hospice. I must admit I was a bit nervous when Seunghyun knocked at the door. When I first got in I was surprised. This room had a normal wooden style floor, light green walls, a large window, lot of plants, a kind of large TV and literally everything you would need to feel home, and it would actually look like a normal living room weren’t there the hospital bed and an ECG machine. Even though it was quite warm in here his father was covered with blankets. When I first saw him, I swear they looked so similar. He immediately turned his head and gave me a smile. A heart-warming and friendly, but also tired smile.

  
“Daesung,” he greeted me with a warm smile, “finally. I have heard a lot about you.”

  
“Nice to meet you Sir”, I smiled back and sat down next to his father. Ignoring the fact that I was happy about the fact that Seunghyun had told his father about me, I actually didn’t like the fact that he had already heard lots about me, simply because I did not know WHAT he knew.

  
“How was your day Daesung?”

  
“It was good.” And this time it was the truth. “Yours?”

And then we both looked at each other and laughed.

  
“Well, I can´t really leave my spot, every day I don’t have to eat beans my day is fine”, he said jokingly. I kind of admired his motivation and good mood at his stage, really. I have done lots of research on medical practices and illnesses already to know that he might feel like everything but fine right now.  
“Well I love beans,” I stated, “Seoul has an amazing system called post.” I grinned, no sure whether I was in the position to make jokes. “I will keep that in mind”, he grinned and turned his head towards Seunghyun.  
“Daesung, dad, would you like something to drink?” We both nodded and he closed the door behind him silently.  
“My son is a good person, really. I couldn’t be any prouder”, he smiled now looking at me. “He really likes you. There is no visit when he did not talk about you. Even when you make him upset.” He grinned. I did too, even though I did not feel like it. What had he told about me, help. I thought for a second and then smiled. “Yes, he is indeed.”

  
“Can you promise me something?"

  
I nodded.

  
“I don’t know why, I mean the two of you haven’t been knowing each other for a long time but…I promise you he likes you tremendously and from what I have heard, even though you make him upset sometimes, you must be an amazing man Daesung and, I believe you have a good heart of which there aren’t many out there.”

  
The longer he talked the faster my heart was beating. I am not that amazing I wanted to say but I kept quiet and honestly, all of this was so touching. And Seunghyun had really not lied and had truly meant what he had said to me in the car.

  
“And you know I don’t have much time left so…please keep an eye on Seunghyun when I am gone. Especially as he is not always as happy as he pretends to be. So…”

  
“I promise”, I said clearly and almost under tears. Don’t cry Daesung, don’t cry. He then took my hand with his, and looked directly into my eyes. They reminded me so much of Seunghyuns´. “Thank you”, he smiled and let go of my hand. He seemed so weak. Cancer must have done his job already. Even his hands looked so fragile and weak and if I was not mistaken, I saw red spots all over his skin which was not covered by blankets and clothes.

Right then Seunghyun came back and gave me a hot cup of tea. His father was right. Seunghyun was precious. He was a great man. Really. If I were a woman and he single, whereas first mentioned was the biggest problem. If. That was bitter.

  
“Dad, I need to tell you something.”

  
“Yes, my son?”

  
That did not sound good. And not like I should or would want to hear that. “I need to go to the toilet.”

  
“No, it´s okay”, Seunghyun wanted to stop me but…no. I went out and just when I wanted to close the door I heard Seunghyun saying the sentence.

  
“Dad, I want to ask Sunmi to marry me.”

 

 

# _Seunghyun_

Okay, it was out. I kind of expected him to now smile and be happy but the only thing he said was: “You don´t need to marry just because I´d like to Seunghyun.”

  
“But dad, it´s because I want to.” Not really. It was for him, really. I should have known that he would react like this, it’s my dad after all. I just knew he was happy if I gave him the feeling that it was me who did it for his own sake and I mean…I loved her. Right? As or the marriage, when it came to the both of us, we could have waited but for my dad´s sake we couldn’t wait much longer. Both of us, Sunmi and I, had agreed upon that.

  
“Seunghyun, as long as you are happy: I am. But…I don’t know, you don’t look happy with that idea.”

  
“Dad…”

  
“Seunghyun, I know that you want to get married before I go but…but I don’t want to leave an unhappy you.”

  
“But dad, I really love her. And both of us agreed that we might consider an early marriage…”

That talk that we had had happened before our fight, but I just hoped that it was still valid.

  
“Okay, then you have my agreement.” He softly smiled at me and squeezed my hand.  
“Okay I will ask her,” I said fiercly. I expected him to wish me good luck or anything, but nothing. Why couldn’t I just look happy to him, wasn’t I happy? No. No I was happy. And I would ask her tomorrow. Definitely. How much time did he have left, two months? Probably not even. So, the time had now come. Just when I was about to open my mouth, I heard heavy breathing and noticed dad had fallen asleep once again. I sighed and just waited for Daesung to come back and leave. My dad would not wake up before morning and it admittedly was already 11pm.

But for the next ten minutes he did not come back. I decided to leave, took his jacket and search for Daesung. I squeezed dad´s hand and gave him a sad smile. Why him. Why. A tear left my eye but crying was not an option. I looked at him one last time and left.  
But Daesung wasn´t on the toilet. And nowhere in the hallways either. Where are you? I couldn’t shout out for him so I went down and looked outside. But nothing. Wait. I saw footprints someone had left in the snow. It must be Daesung´s as they seemed quite fresh. But wait, they were leading to the wrong direction. They were leading towards the entrance but if, Daesung must have walked in the other direction.

At some point there were weird traces in the snow directly at the edge of the stairs. I knew why I didn´t watch horror movies, seriously. Still, my worries were bigger than my fear so I went down. Nothing made sense. Really. I looked in the car. Nothing. No message. I went back up the stairs to the entrance when I suddenly heard some weird noises. Seriously. The time to run would have now come in horror movies. I already heard Daesung´s voice Run idiot, run. Where did it come from? It was so close but nothing. Wait. There seemed to be some space between the wall and the banisters, almost three metres deep. I hurried down and opened my eyes in shock.

  
“Daesung!”, I screamed and ran towards him.


	7. Strange Happenings

_#Seunghyun_

 

“Daesung!”, I screamed and ran towards him.

He was awake but shivering all over. “Seunghyun”, he said with a weak voice, barely being able to open his eyes.

“I will bring you inside!” I took his jacket, put it over his shoulders and picked him up to carry him upstairs. Just when I was about to enter the building, Daesung stopped me from doing so.  “Daesung, I´m gonna bring you in there. Now. You fell three metres deep, are all frozen and…no!” I wanted to continue walking, but Daesung made one movement and left my hold. He couldn’t barely stand on his own and his legs were shivering.

“Please just bring me home, I´m fine”, he said but did not even dare to look at me. I couldn’t hold myself and almost started shouting.

“YOU´RE NOT FINE!” I saw a moment of shock flattering through Daesung´s eyes. “Please, Seunghyun…”

“I…I am sorry. But…” This man was stubborn as hell and I couldn’t drag him to a doctor soon but still, I didn´t give up. “Daesung, please. Do it for me at least. Just a quick check I mean there are several doctors in here. Daesung-“

“Okay!”, he almost screamed, “Okay. Bring me in there.”

 

One hour later we were on our way to my car once again.

“See,” Daesung said, “only an arm contusion and a mild concussion.”

“Only?? You heard what the doctor said: get some rest. I will drive you home now.” Indeed, I was happy that nothing worse had happened but still. What had happened to Daesung? I didn´t want to bother him with questions already but I was curious. Probably not a bad habit in this case. I put Daesung into my car and drove him home. I helped him change his clothes, laid him down in his bed, covered him with as many blankets as I was able to find, made him a tea and measured his temperature.

“38,8. You should have stayed at that hospital when the doctor recommended to do so, Daesung.” But he managed to shake his head. “Okay, then tell me what happened.”

Still having his eyes closed, he began to tell: “I don’t know, I went out because…I wasn’t feeling well and then I blacked out on the stairs.”

“But I found you three metres deeper in a small space behind the stairs.”

“I know that´s weird but I was leaning on the banisters and fell backwards. I think.”

Sounded reasonable. Still, this whole situation was weird. And what about the traces in the snow? But for now, it might have been better to let him rest so I decided to leave him alone. When I was about to get up, a hand grabbed my wrist. “Please…don´t go”, he managed to say with a weak voice and a weak smile crossed my face.

“I will only get something to cool your head, you´re burning.” When I had done so I sat down again. He must have fallen asleep already. I decided to lay down next to him and took a small part of the blanket, so that I felt some of Daesung´s heat. It was just a matter of time that he would collapse after all this stress and happenings. _What are you doing Daesung._ But still I felt like Daesung was keeping what had really happened to him for himself. Can one just fall back over the bannisters by leaning on them? But he would not talk too soon anyway, so guess I simply had to accept his answer. And that he might have collapsed because of all this stress is not a surprise after all. I now took another look at him and sighed. I mean, I was lying here. In one bed. With – an admittedly sick – Daesung. Even though I wanted to propose to Sunmi tomorrow. “Damn, how should I propose to her.” I wish I could have asked someone, I really did, but my dad: no. Jiyong? Of course not, he was the reason for the breakup after all. Other “friends” I knew, nope. And Daesung…he had the potential to be the next reason for a breakup. No, joke. But seriously. I didn’t know why I didn’t want to ask him, I mean we were kind of friends at this stage. Or still boss and employee-  No. I would do it spontaneously. And words were rather one of my strengths so that wouldn’t be much of a problem. ARGH. I didn’t know. And as of next week, our collection would have need to be finished. And Jiyong needed the last sketches on Tuesday which was…the day after tomorrow. Great. I grabbed my bag, found my papers and pencil and: nothing. Unfortunately, my mind was very much filled with everything else so that I sometimes even forgot that I had a job to do.

With having Daesung in mind, I sketched his body and hair and imagined him in “daily life” situations. Not what he would wear -because his fashion style was horrible, well not horrible, there…was just no style at all- but what he should wear or what would suit him. To be honest, that didn’t make things better after all. And like that, I continued throughout the night, with Daesung not moving one bit next to me.

The next morning, I woke up to an empty bed at nine in the morning. Damn, I must have fallen asleep somewhen but still, my sketches were laying stapled on the side desk. I went through them once again and: they did not look bad. One of the sketches held a small note next it. _“Oh, I like that one”._ I grinned. It was a leather based, black only outfit, which was also my favourite outfit. It showed one´s body nicely and was very tight whereas the shirt left some room, but still touched the body. Okay yes, this sketch was genius. But where the hell was Daesung?

“Daesung?” Nothing. “Daesung??” Wait. He went to work. He seriously went to work! Damn, I should have woken up to stop him, I mean there was a reason for what had happened yesterday and he knew that. I tried to call him: nothing. It was as easy as that. I would go there. To his workplace. It couldn’t be that he…Entering the kitchen I saw that he had made pancakes once again and placed the hot chocolate right beside it. And a letter next to it.

 

_Good morning Seunghyun_

_I hope you slept well. Sorry, you know I had to go to work and I know pancakes and hot chocolate aren’t enough to apologize. However, this is my decision and you don’t need to act like you care that much, Seunghyun. I know you. And I know this is just how you are. But I can take care of myself (okay maybe not but let´s just pretend I can) Thanks for taking care of me that well, really. But I don’t want to be a burden to you. Especially regarding your relationship with Sunmi and I don’t want to be the reason for you being unhappy because of a fight with her or anything. You shouldn’t talk to yourself aloud at night, seriously. Today is your day, Seunghyun. (Didn’t you tell me she went to see her mother and is coming back today? I guess there would be no more surprising and romantic proposal than directly at the station or airport.) Good luck! And see you at work._

_In love,_

_Daesung_

_P.S.: Is my style that horrible?! I´m hurt:D_

 

Shit. That was the only thing I could think at that moment. If I had spoken out my thoughts Daesung must have heard things that he shouldn’t have heard, ever. But did I ever talk aloud when being in thoughts? Not that I knew at least. But fact was: I didn’t mean it like that, I mean we got close so fast and I loved being with him. And why was he so extremely complicated and stubborn. I needed to talk to him. Now. After…some pancakes. He would probably be sad if I didn’t eat them anyway. Plus, he had made them even though he had been sick to death and his arm hurt. Right then my phone rang.

“Seunghyun, you´re awake!”, Sunmi greeted me, and I was never that relieved to hear her voice. “Could you pick me up from the station?”

I smiled. “Sure, honey. Give me some time.”

“That´s fine, I am going to arrive in 45 minutes.”

45 minutes. I had only 45 minutes left for everything and the planning. I had the rings already. Well, I had been ready to propose to her once already but then this happened and…come on _Seunghyun, be a man. You got this. Be spontaneous. You will find words._

I went back to grab my sketches and other stuff, went out, and closed the door and came back when I remembered that I had forgotten something.

 

 

_#Daesung_

I don´t know for how long I´d been cleaning this one spot on the table at the church cafeteria. My mind was one big chaos, I was angry, I was sad, I felt…empty. I´m glad the cafeteria was already closed as there was no one left to get on my nerves. Had I seriously wished him good luck? After he had clearly – okay, involuntarily – declared that I was a burden when it came to their relationship? Yes, I had. But what else should I have done. _Hey Seunghyun, I guess I´m gay and in love with you, could you please leave her and love me?_ Probably exactly that. It was better if I would not see him for the next time outside the shootings and work. I had not forgotten the promise I gave his dad but…I didn´t know. I would change my mind some when anyways. But when I woke up this morning I had felt like I had to do this. I felt like shit anyway, especially after yesterday. When Seunghyun had told his dad about his proposal plans I simply had to get some fresh air and I indeed had been leaning on the banisters. The only part Seunghyun did not know that there had been someone. Someone that had accidently or not accidently pushed me while running by. But if Seunghyun would know he would never stop asking and he really had better things to do right now. And the result was still the same. My head killed me, I was able to only use one arm for cleaning, I was feeling hot and cold at the same time, and my nose and throat were killing me, but all of this was better than if I would have missed work today.

“Daesung, you´re still not done?!”, my dad said angrily from behind and gave me a hit on my back so that I almost lost my balance. “Soon, father”, I said, not even daring to look up.

“You better do, or,” he now leaned down and whispered into my ear so that I could feel his breath, “you know what will happen”, he grinned and left, leaving me with goose bumps all over. No. Not again. I thought that was over _. Don´t think of it, Daesung, don’t think of it. Everything will be fine._

I tried to clean the rest and leave this place as fast as possible. And when I closed the door to my room at home, I broke down. I grabbed my head with both hands when my head felt like falling and pain was killing me. I let myself fall to the ground and tears fell. Sadness and anger and pain had now gotten control all over me and my body. And it hurt. Everything just hurt. My phone had been ringing for felt hours when I finally dared to look at the screen. Youngbae.

 _“Daesung are you okay??!”_ He almost shouted into his phone. I cleared my voice and tried to sound as calm as possible. “ _Daesung?!”_

“Yes I´m fine.” The biggest lie ever told.

_“Are you sure? You don’t sound like it…”_

“Yes, Youngbae. Why are you even asking, you will come home soon anyway right?”

He hesitated for a moment. “ _I have tried to call you earlier and Seunghyun called me.”_

“Aha.” Why the hell was he everywhere. I clinched my fist to not break out in tears again.

“When will you come home?”

“ _I will arrive late, around 10pm, should I bring some food and we´re gonna watch some random movies and beer?”_

“Yes, I´d really like to”, I said with a slight smile which faded immediately.

_“Okay, see you Daesung.”_

“See you! Be careful.” And he hung up. And I was alone again. When I went to the kitchen and made myself a tea I noticed that the letter was still there, as well as the pancakes. Why the hell had I even made them. When I took the letter to throw it away, I noticed that there was something else written on the backside, written with Seunghyun´s beautiful handwriting. Even his handwriting was beautiful.

 

 

_Dear Daesung,_

_I am sorry I couldn’t eat the pancakes. Really, I was about to eat them when she called. It´s a pity because they are actually amazing. And Daesung, what I said was…yes, I can´t take back what I said or thought or whatever, and I don’t even know what you heard in the end, but I want you to know that it´s true. I am afraid, Daesung. Afraid because I once made a huge mistake. And I don’t want to make this mistake again. Afraid what Sunmi might think and misunderstand. It´s not your fault Daesung, you´re amazing, seriously. I haven’t felt this comfortable with a friend for a long time plus: my father likes you which is a quite tricky thing to achieve:D I appreciate you and I want you to know that. And you should know best that having contact on work only sounds unrealistic, you should know me better. Plus: otherwise I would miss my friend. Thanks so much for your hint, I will try my best! I should really leave but I found it quite rude to just leave your letter and not answer just like that._

_And please do me a favour: get some rest, you look awful! I would rather say you should see a doctor, but I know you wouldn’t listen to me anyways._

_In love,_

_Seunghyun_

 

“Appreciate my ass!”, I screamed and threw the letter away just to pick it up afterwards anyway. I looked awful, I felt awful, my whole situation was awful to be all honest. I didn´t even know what it was worth living for still, seriously. Just then Sammy came to me and licked my hand. Well, there it was. Even though…he still had Youngbae. “You´re hungry, right Sammy?”, I smiled sadly at him and put some feed into his nap. The whole evening, I just walked from one corner to another without even knowing what I was doing. At some point, I thought I would collapse any moment, so I closed the door to my room, laid down around 8 pm and did not decide to leave it too soon. I texted Youngbae that I just wasn’t feeling well so he would not get the idea to bomb me with questions as he was coming home soon and ignored felt thousands of messages and missed calls from Seunghyun. I would only read “she said yes!” and I would have to pretend that I am all happy about it. I mean I felt happy FOR HIM but for me, I couldn’t be unhappier. Oh, a message from Jiyong. And…Seungri. I had totally forgotten him.

I decided to not call Seungri back right now and as for Seunghyun I decided to open it some when later, otherwise he would only come here again. Jiyong just gave me the new dates for tomorrow which was quite of a surprise. I guess Seunghyun didn’t even know he was asking me. I agreed to come tomorrow and threw my phone somewhere. How about I went to sleep on the middle of the road in the fresh, knee-high snow? I would either freeze or being run over by a car or truck.

I covered myself with as many blankets as I could and immediately fell asleep. Even though I woke up when Youngbae came home with food and he knocked at my door, depsite of feeling bad for Youngbae, I pretended to be asleep still as I did not want to talk to anyone today.

 

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

He did not reply until the next morning. I even went to Youngbae´s flat but he had been asleep when I arrived there. I didn’t know why, my worries for him were growing from day to day. And when she had said yes at the station, I expected myself to be the happiest man alive at that moment but…I didn’t know. Yes, I had already expected her to say yes because I knew that both, her and her mother, were ready for us to get married. But was I ready? I was 24 years old, of course I was but…I looked at Sunmi who was sleeping right in my arms. She looked so innocent and peaceful when she slept. And yes, she was beautiful, she had a good heart, everything a man would want. _Come on Seunghyun._ I sighed and looked at my phone: nothing. He must have been on his way to work already. Or lying dead somewhere in the snow after having been beaten up. However, I would see him later at work anyway. Jiyong and I wanted our models to be part of the collection as well, based on their lives and lifestyles. The sketches, I had really made them based on own perception only. I didn’t know whether Daesung was an easy person to read, or a difficult one. I wanted to ask him so many questions about his plans, future, dreams, hobbies and also, Seungri, because I thought he was neither of them. I didn’t really think he was his boyfriend, but…what else? I shouldn’t care anymore, but I did.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

The other morning I arrived quite early, even before 11, and I bet I saw Sunmi´s and Jiyong´s car already. I got into the hallway of the studio and heard both of them discussing. “Don’t you dare!”, Jiyong almost screamed, with Sunmi almost screaming back. “Don’t YOU dare!” What the hell were they talking about? “Don´t worry. I won´t, ever”, Jiyong now replied with a sad voice.

When I got in, both of them departed and pretended to be doing something else. Suspicious. Okay, I was already surprised that they had been getting along so well even though Jiyong was the person I had betrayed her with.  Guess that was also the topic they had just been discussing. “Hey Darling”, Sunmi said with her ever-sweet voice and gave me a light kiss. And then, Daesung came in. He was wearing tight leather pants and a simple pullover. These. Were NOT his clothes for sure. Gosh, he looked awesome. His brown hair was parted in the middle as always, not too short, not too long. But he looked tired. So damn tired. And he still looked sick. I could tell him to see a doctor once again. Or to rest. But he wouldn’t. Even when I had asked Jiyong to give him a few days more off, he had just said that it was his decision only, with what he was definitely right. I should stop caring. Even Daesung himself had told me so. But I couldn´t. Why would I make myself a head out of everything, I hated that.

“So, what are we doing today?”, Daesung sighed, now standing right beside me.

“We have some pre- designs which are not finished, and we need you to finalize and change them according to your preferences and body.”

Thanks god I was responsible for the male designs. Great. Well, I also hoped Jiyong and Sunmi would get along without killing each other. “Okay Daesung, come with me, I have my designs in the wardrobe in my studio.

 

 

_#Daesung_

When we first entered Seunghyun´s studio, awkward silence filled the room, and no one said anything. It felt like the words we had written had built up a wall between the two of us, and no one really wanted to take the first step to break that wall. I mean, I was just awkwardly standing there while Seunghyun was preparing his sketches on a huge white desk. Then, however, he took the first step.

“Nice outfit. Looks a bit familiar though.”, he said, but without that usual grin on his face. “Yeah, I…I got a little inspired. Youngbae once gave this to me but I never dared to wear it.”

Silence.

“Uhm, congratulations on your engagement by the way”, I tried to say with as much enthusiasm I was able to bring up.

“How do you know?”

“Well, you sent me a message right?”

“Yes, I did. But it didn’t say anything about my engagement or Sunmi saying yes or no.”

“B-but-“ Oups. Okay, there was no way to talk myself out of this right now.

“You don´t have to explain yourself. I know you were not well and I get it: no contact outside of work. Sorry for ignoring your words yesterday”, he said with a saddening voice.

“No. No, Seunghyun, listen, I am sorry for not asking and reading and- I am just sorry.” Still, he didn´t dare to look up to me so I grabbed his wrist which made him look directly into my eyes.  “I am honestly not good at apologizing so- Damn. Sorry Seunghyun, please forgive me.”

"I´m okay Daesung, don´t worry about that. And by the way, she said yes", he said with an emotionless voice, now dedicating his attention towards the designs again. "So, let´s get started."

 

 

When we had finished,I grabbed my jacket and left as soon as possible. When I went outside, Seungri was already waiting for me outside, leaning on his car. I must admit that his outfit looked good today. Tight black pants and a tight black pullover. He must have started training and yes, he looked quite good today, even though I could slap myself for this thought. When I came down I saw a nervous smile crossing his face, as if he had something to tell me.

“You look good today”, I complimented him which caused him to look down on himself and blush.

“T…thank you I guess? Get in.” I did like I was told.

“What are we going to do today?”

“That´s a surprise.”

Oh god. Usually surprises were a good thing but when it came to Seungri you never knew. Looking outside I saw that we had left the city lights behind and now trees passing by. Since it was winter, it had gotten dark very early which meant: Christmas was near. I looked at Seungri and sighed, who was forcedly staring at the street all the time. The surprise better be good if he is driving that far in the cold. The coldness let me snuggle deeper into my jacket - Seunghyuns jacket. I couldn’t help to close my eyes and imagining how it would be to now spend the evening with Seunghyun rather with Seungri. But said man now had a fiancée at home and would probably marry quite soon because of his dad and my life would just go on as it always did, with the only difference being in love with a man I would never get.  How about Seungri: he cared, he was nice, a little weird indeed and super rich. I looked at him and shuddered at the thought of only kissing him.

“We´re there.” He stopped the car. But I couldn’t really see where exactly he stopped. “Here, I want it to be a surprise”, he said and bound a scarf so that I was completely blind, which made me feel quite uncomfortable.

“Seungri, where-“

“Psst”, he pressed a finger on my lips and I shut up. “It´s a surprise.”

He grabbed both of my hands and walked in front of me to lead me carefully. The snow was very high, and it was the hardest to not slip. I noticed him opening a door and heard wood cracking under my feet. After a few more steps we stopped, but Seungri didn’t loosen the scarf. Instead, he just started talking again, this time, with a cracking and thin voice.

“Daesung, listen I…I am sorry, alright? But I didn’t have a choice.” His voice gave me goose bumps.

“Seungri what-“

“I know you may think that´s not me but people are often different from what you expect them to be. Please, Please remember that Daesung”, he whispered right beneath my ear, still with a shaky voiceas if he was about to cry. My mind told me to run but my body tensed. Plus, I didn’t know where I was, I was blind, and I was in the middle of nowhere. “I´m sorry”, he whispered one more time and silence filled the room.

Suddenly I felt the pungent pain of a needle in my arm. I wanted to grab it but two strong hands grabbed my wrists. I tried to escape the grip, ignoring the pain still caused by the hospital accident, but there was no use. Suddenly my legs started feeling numb followed by my whole body which made me lose my hold. The hands let go of me and I crashed onto the floor. I wanted to move but I had no chance, even though my mind was clear. I wanted to speak, to scream, to cry – but I couldn’t . How could I, because a second later someone grabbed my head and kissed me without me reacting. I felt awful. I felt helpless. I felt nothing. Right after I heard some opening a belt buckle and- stop. STOP.

I knew what was happening here. I knew. And I couldn’t do anything but lying there, not even able to do anything. Someone ripped my shirt, buttons flying throughout the whole room. And then, someone grabbed my belt roughly, opened it, followed by my pants. Why. Why was this happening.

Not again.

My body started shivering, tears were running down my cheeks, with silent screams filling my mind.

Just when I felt someone pulling down my pants, I heard fast running steps coming closer and that person stopped with his actions.

“You fucking bastard!” I heard someone being beaten and falling to the ground.

 

 

 

 

_#Seunghyun_

That fucking bastard. I pulled the masked person away and pushed him against the wall, letting out all my anger and disgust. I wanted to catch up on him but it would be impossible to catch him. The last thing I saw was Seungris car leaving through lonely the lonely forest. I hoped he would get lost – forever. Damn, Daesung! I ran back to that room and saw him lying there, his eyes still bound. He had not moved even a bit. He was breathing heavily, sweat running down his face.

“Daesung, it´s me, he´s gone. I….I´m gonna remove the scarf…now.” With shivering hands I untied the knot slowly and removed the scarf. Daesung slowly opened his all teary eyes, slowly directing his eyes towards me without moving, and it felt like a dab, a dab into my soul. What I saw was fear, sadness, disgust, emptiness. I would kill that guy if I´d ever see him again. I quickly removed my jacket and my pullover and pulled it over him, even though I was afraid to even touch him. His body was shivering all over, his breath heavy, and sweat covering his skin like oil.

With shaking hands, I grabbed my phone to call the ambulance, but the connection was dead. I immediately grabbed Daesung and seated him on the front seat and fixed him, as he was barely able to move or hold himself up. Really, I did not really know how to act right now. It felt like I had tiny little new-born in my arms that would die as soon as I would make one wrong move.

With the snow continuing to fall heavily I tried to restart the car over and over. When I finally got the car started, I wasn´t able to even move one millimetre as the wheels slipped on the icy ground. Just before giving up, the car made a rough move forward. Thanks god. Still, driving was not easy. The streets were covered by a layer of ice, and due to heavy snow fall sight was lower than 10 metres. After driving felt hours, Daesung seemed to recover from the injection but I couldn´t convince him to either go to the police or a hospital.

“Daesung, we need to go to the police!” I almost screamed at him in despair.

“Seunghyun, no, please.” Daesung managed to say with a husky voice. “M…my hand.” My eyes wandered to his left hand, which held a tiny paper.

"Stop it or this, will have been only the beginning. And Daesung, don´t tell anyone


End file.
